CORNELL UNIVERSITY LIBRARY BOUGHT WITH THE INCOME OF THE SAGE ENDOWMENT FUND GIVEN IN 1891 BY HENRY WILLIAMS SAGE Digitized by Microsoft® DATE DUE Q^^rMMir' }^Z l Ji- PRINTED IN U.S.A. Cornell University Library F 1418.L81 Pan-Americanism: its beginnings 3 1924 021 073 808 Digitized by Microsoft® This book was digitized by Microsoft Corporation in cooperation with Cornell University Libraries, 2007. You may use and print this copy in limited quantity for your personal purposes, but may not distribute or provide access to it (or modified or partial versions of it) for revenue-generating or other commercial purposes. Digitized by Microsoft® The original of this book is in the Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924021073808 Digitizes by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® PAN AMERICANISM ITS BEGINNINGS Digitized by Microsoft® THE MACMILLAN COMPANY HEW YORK • BOSTON - CHICAGO • DALLAS ATLANTA • SAN FRANCISCO MACMILLAN & CO., Limited LONDON - BOMBAY • CALCUTTA MELBOURNE THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, Ltd. TORONTO Digitized by Microsoft® PAN -AMERICANISM ITS BEGINNINGS BY JOSEPH BYRNE LOCKEY I9eto gotk THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 1920 All rights reserved Digitized by Microsoft® -%y~r*y ^\\WS COPYRIGHT, 1920, BY THE MACMILLAN COMPANY Set up and printed. Published, April, 1920 F LP I \Bigitized by Microsoft® UiUi £ " Nature in making us inhabitants of the same continent has in some sort united us in the bonds of a common patriotism." Maia to Jeffeeson. Digitized by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® PREFACE The history of Pan-Americanism falls roughly into three periods. The first, embracing the years of revolution and of the formation of new states, extends to about 1830 ; the second covers the succeeding three or four decades to the close of the Civil War; and the third extends from the Civil War to the present time. Of these periods the first is characterized by a strong tendency toward continental solidarity, the second by the opposite tendency toward particularism and distrust, and the third by the revival of the earlier tendency toward fraternal cooperation. The present study is devoted to the early period, the period of beginnings. It was undertaken and carried to completion as an academic task at Columbia University, under the direction and counsel of Professor John Bassett Moore, to whom the writer acknowledges a deep debt of gratitude. He is also under great obligations to Dr. Angel Cesar Bivas, who, during the course of the preparation of the book and while it was in proof, made helpful suggestions and invaluable criti- cisms ; to Miss S. Elizabeth Davis, who read the proof ; and to Senor D. Manuel Segundo Sanchez for various favord re- ceived. Finally, he takes this method of expressing his thanks to the Hispanic Society of Am erica for the use of its valuable collection of old newspapers, and to the New York Public Library, whose great' assemblage of books and pamphlets re- lating to Spanish and Portuguese America, constituted the main body of his source material. J. B. L. George Peabody College, Nashville, Tennessee. April, 1920. Digitized by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® CONTENTS PAGE I Meaning of Pan- Americanism 1 II Formation of New States 36 III Failure of Monarchical Plots 82 IV United States and Hispanic American Independence . 134 V International Complications . 172 VI Hispanic America and the Monroe Doctrine .... 223 VH Early Projects of Continental Union 263 Vni The Panama Congress 312 IX British Influence 355 X Attitude of the United States 393 XL Argentina, Brazil, and Chile 434 Bibliography 468 Index 487 Digitized by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® PAN- AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS CHAPTER I MEANING OF PAN-AMERICANISM It is obviously desirable to know what Pan-Americanism means, before an attempt is made to discover its beginnings. The term itself is new. It is one of an increasing number of similar compounds wbicb have come to be widely used since the middle of the last century. Modern tongues are indebted to the ancient Greek for the prefix and for models of its use with national names. Pan-Hellenes, for example, signified the united Greeks; Pan-Ionian was used to describe whatever per- tained to all the Ionians ; and the Panathenaea was the national festival of Athens, held to celebrate the union of Attica under Theseus. Of the modern combinations Pan-Slavism and Pan- Slavist were the first to gain currency. The movement for the union of all the Slavonic peoples in one political organization originated in the second quarter of the nineteenth century, and somewhat later began to be described as Panslavism. Jowett used Panslavismus in 1846; * and in 1850 Longfellow, in mak- ing an entry in his journal, defined the term as " the union of all the Slavonic tribes under one head, and that head Rus- sia." 2 About 1860 the movement for the political union of all the Greeks began to be called Pan-Hellenism. Then fol- lowed Pan-Germanism, Pan-Islamism, Pan-Celticism, and so on, with an ever increasing number of movements designated by similar compounds. i Life and Letters, I, 156. 2 S. W. Longfellow, Life of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, II, 176. 1 Digitized by Microsoft® 2 PAN-AMEKICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS The term Pan-Americanism was first used in newspaper dis- cussions relating to the International American Conference held at Washington in 1889-90. The New York Evening Post appears to have been the first to employ it. 3 To the Post is also to be credited the first use of the adjective, Pan-American. This term was introduced into the columns of the Post in 1882, 4 during the agitation of Mr. Blaine's first proposal for a conference of American states at Washington. But it was little used until the conference convened in 1889, when, having been adopted by other leading dailies, it soon won universal acceptance. 5 The substantive, Pan-Americanism, did not so quickly become current. Indeed, not until the last decade or two has it been widely employed. To-day it is encountered with ever increasing frequency. It is constantly recurring in newspapers and periodicals; and gradually it is also finding a place in works on international law and diplomacy. The adjective, Pan-American, and the substantive, Pan-Amer- icanism, were soon taken up and defined by the dictionaries; but the definitions are not satisfactory. The adjective is usually denned as including or pertaining to the whole of Amer- ica, both North and South ; which is inaccurate, as it pertains, by common usage, to the independent part of the continent only. The definitions of the substantive, though not subject to this criticism, are none the less inaccurate. Not only so, but they are widely divergent among themselves. To become convinced of this requires but a glance at the definitions of some of the standard dictionaries. The New In- 3 March 5, 1888. * June 27. Murray erroneously attributes its first appearance to the issue of the Evening Post of September 27, 1889. o The New York Sun used the term September 12, 1889; the London Times, September 30, 1889; the London Spectator January 29, 1890; Paul Leroy-Beaulieu in an article published in the Journal des DGbats on Octo- ber 15, 1889, discussed the conference at length, but did not describe it as Pan-American. On December 28, 1889, however, L'Economiste Francois, a weekly of which Leroy-Beaulieu was editor, admitted the word into its columns. The term Pan-American appears to have been introduced into the other American republics from the United States. Digitized by Microsoft® MEANING- OF PAN-AMERICANISM 3 ternational defines it as : " The principle or advocacy of a political alliance or union of all the states of America " ; The New Standard, as " The advocacy of a political union of the various states of the Western Hemisphere; also the life of the American people as represented in republican forms of govern- ment and tending toward such a union " ; Murray as " The idea or sentiment of a political alliance or union of all the states of North and South America " ; La Grande Encyclopedie as a " Political doctrine tending to group all the American states in a sort of federation under the hegemony of the United States " ; Nouveau Larousse as a " Doctrine according to which the people of European origin who have founded states in the New World aim to exclude other states from the exercise of sovereignty over them " ; and finally, the second supplement of the Diccionario Enciclopedico Hispano-Americano as the " As- piration or tendency of the peoples of the New World to estab- lish among themselves ties of union; to promote good under- standing and fraternal harmony between all the states of the continent; and to act always in accord with a view to prevent- ing the dominance or the influence of European powers in American territory." The bringing of these set definitions into juxtaposition sug- gests some important questions. Is Pan-Americanism an ad- vocacy, an idea, a sentiment, an aspiration, a tendency, a prin- ciple, or a doctrine ? Is it one, or all, or any number of these combined? Is it the life of the American people as repre^ sented in the republican form of government? Does it aim to federate the American republics under the hegemony of the United States? If so, exactly what is meant by hegemony? Is its only aim the exclusion of European powers from the fur- ther acquisition of territory or from the exercise of sovereignty in the New World ? To raise these questions is to disclose the necessity of further inquiry. That the formulation of a precise definition of Pan-Amer- icanism would be attended with great difficulty is evident ; and Digitized by Microsoft® 4 PAN-AMEKICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS little would be gained by attempting it. Our aim, therefore, will be rather to describe than to define. With this end in view, we shall endeavor to discover in the expressions of American statesmen and publicists the material for such a brief and exact description as will afford the reader an adequate conception of the meaning of the term. The views of James G. Blaine, the dominant figure in the Washington Conference which furnished the occasion for the adoption of the new name, may be con- sidered first. In an article on the foreign policy of the Garfield adminis- tration, which he published in the Chicago Weekly Magazine for September 16, 1882, Blaine set forth the ideas which he held at that time on the subject of the international relations of the American states. The foreign policy of the Garfield administration, he said, had two principal objects in view: " First to bring about peace and prevent future wars in North and South America; second, to cultivate such friendly com- mercial relations with all American countries as would lead to a large increase in the export trade of the United States by sup- plying those fabrics in which we are abundantly able to com- pete with the manufacturing nations of Europe." In order to attain the second object it was necessary, Blaine declared, to accomplish the first. " Instead of friendly intervention here and there — patching up a treaty between two countries to- day, securing a truce between two others to-morrow — it was apparent . . . that a more comprehensive plan should be adopted, if wars were to cease in the Western Hemisphere." In short, Pan-Americanism, as Blaine conceived it in 1882, was expressed in two words, peace and commerce, attained by means of the friendly counsel and cooperation of all the Amer- ican states and redounding equally to the benefit of all. Seven years later, in his address of welcome to the delegates to the International American Conference, he set forth his views with greater fullness. He said : " The delegates I am addressing can do much to establish Digitized by Microsoft® MEANING OF PAN-AMEKICANISM 5 permanent relations of confidence, respect, and friendship be- tween the nations which they represent. They can show to the world an honorable, peaceful conference of eighteen inde- pendent American powers, in which all shall meet together on terms of absolute equality; a conference in which there can be no attempt to coerce a single delegate against his own concep- tion of the interests of his nation ; a conference which will per- mit no secret understanding on any subject, but will frankly publish to the world all its conclusions; a conference which will tolerate no spirit of conquest but will aim to cultivate an American sympathy as broad as both continents, a conference which will form no selfish alliance against the older nations from which we are proud to claim inheritance — a conference, in fine, which will seek nothing, propose nothing, endure noth- ing that is not, in the general sense of the delegates, timely and wise and peaceful. " And yet we cannot be expected to forget that our common fate has made us inhabitants of the two continents which, at the close of four centuries, are still regarded beyond the seas as the New World. Like situations beget like sympathies and impose like duties. We meet in firm belief that the nations of America ought to be and can be more helpful, each to the other, than they now are, and that each will find advantage and profit from an enlarged intercourse with the others. " We believe that we should be drawn together more closely by the highways of the sea, and that at no distant day the rail- way systems of the North and South will meet upon the Isthmus and connect by land routes the political and commercial cap- itals of all America. " We believe that hearty cooperation, based on hearty confi- dence, will save all American states from the burdens and evils which have long and cruelly afflicted the older nations of the world. " We believe that a spirit of justice, of common and equal interest between the American states, will leave no room for an Digitized by Microsoft® 6 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS artificial balance of power like unto that which has led to wars abroad and drenched Europe in blood. " We believe that friendship, avowed with candor and main- tained with good faith, will remove from American states the necessity of guarding boundary lines between themselves with fortifications and military force. " We believe that standing armies, beyond those which are needful for public order and the safety of internal administra- tion, should be unknown on both American continents. " We believe that friendship and not force, the spirit of just law and not violence of the mob, should be the recognized rule of administration between American nations and in American nations." 6 Permanent relations of confidence, respect, and friendship; equality; no coercion; no secret understandings; no conquest; no selfish alliance against the older nations from which we are sprung; no balance of power; no threatening armies; mutual helpfulness; commerce; the spirit of just law as the rule of administration between American nations and in American na- tions — this was Blaine's later conception of the guiding prin- ciples of Pan- Americanism. And with this conception the statesmen and publicists of all the American republics have been subsequently in substantial agreement. President Roosevelt, in his instructions to the United States delegates to the second International American Conference, which met at Mexico City in October, 1901, declared among other things, that " The chief interest of the United States in relation to the other republics upon the American continent is the safety and permanence of the political system which under- lies their and our existence as nations — the system of self- government by the people. It is, therefore, to be desired that all the American republics should enjoy in full measure the blessings of perfect freedom under just laws, each sovereign « International American Conference 1,1889-90), I 40-42. Digitized by Microsoft® MEANING OF PAN-AMERICANISM 1 community pursuing its own course of orderly development ■without external restraint or interference. " Nothing," he added, " is of greater importance from a po- litical point of view than that the United States should be understood to be the friend of all the Latin-American republics and the enemy of none. To this end it will be prudent to pro- pose nothing radical, to favor a free expression of views among the delegates of the other powers, and to favor and support only such measures as have the weight of general acceptance and clearly tend to promote the common good." 7 When the third International Conference met at Rio de Janeiro an 1906, Roosevelt still being President, the United States delegates were provided with a copy of the instructions of 1901, by which they were to be guided, as a review of those instructions indicated no occasion for changing them except in some minor details. The delegates, however, were reminded by Mr. Root, who was then Secretary of State, that " The true function of such a conference is to deal with matters of com- mon interest which are not really subjects of controversy, but upon which comparison of views and friendly discussions may smooth away differences of detail, develop substantial agree- ment, and lead to cooperation along common lines for the at- tainment of objects which all really desire." And he added that the least of the benefits anticipated from the conference would be " the establishment of agreeable personal relations, the removal of misconceptions and prejudices, and the habit of temperate and kindly discussion among the representatives of so many republics." 8 It was during the summer of 1906 that Mr. Root made his celebrated visit to South America. Though not a delegate to the conference at Rio, he was present for a few days during its progress. On July 31 he made a speech at an extraordinary lint. Am. Gonf. (1902), report of the U. S. delegates, 31, 32. s Int. Am. Con). (1906), report of the U. S. delegates, 39, 40. Digitized by Microsoft® 8 PAN-AMEPJCANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS session of the conference, in which he made the following dec- laration which has often been quoted : "We wish for no victories but those of peace; for no terri- tory except our own; for no sovereignty except the sovereignty over ourselves. We deem the independence and equal rights of the smallest and weakest member of the family of nations entitled to as much respect as those of the greatest empire, and deem the observance of that respect the chief guaranty of the weak against the oppression of the strong. We neither claim nor desire any rights, or privileges, or powers that we do not freely concede to every American republic. We wish to in- crease our prosperity, to expand our trade, to grow in wealth, in wisdom, and in spirit, but our conception of the true way to accomplish this is not to pull down others and profit by their ruin, but to help all friends to a common prosperity and a com- mon growth, that we may all become greater and stronger to- gether." 9 In his message of December 1, 1915, President Wilson, de- claring that we had been put to the test in the case of Mexico, and that we had stood the test, characterized Pan-Americanism as follows: " The moral is, that the states of America are not hostile rivals but cooperating friends, and that their growing sense of community of interest, alike in matters political and in matters economic, is likely to give them a new significance as factors in international affairs and in the political history of the world. It presents them as in a very deep and true sense a unit in World affairs, spiritual partners, standing together because thinking together, quick with common sympathies and common ideals. Separated, they are subject to all the cross-currents of the confused politics of a world of hostile rivalries ; united in spirit and purpose, they cannot be disappointed of their peace- ful destiny. This is Pan-Americanism. It has none of the spirit of empire in it. It is the embodiment, the effectual em- 9 Root, Latin America and the United States, Addresses, 10. Digitized by Microsoft® MEANING OF PAN-AMERICANISM 9 bodiment, of the spirit of law and independence and liberty and mutual service." 10 Before the second Pan-American Scientific Congress, which met at Washington in the latter part of 1915, Mr. Lansing, Secretary of State, made an address in which he expressed at some length his views on the subject of Pan-Americanism. Ac- cording to him, " there has grown up a feeling that the repub- lics of this hemisphere constitute a group separate and apart from the other nations of the world." . . . This feeling, he said, we term " the Pan-American spirit," and from it springs the " international policy of Pan- Americanism." Continuing, he declared : " If I have correctly interpreted Pan- Americanism from the standpoint of the relations of our governments with those beyond the seas, it is in entire harmony with the Monroe Doctrine. The Monroe Doctrine is a national policy of the United States; Pan- Americanism is an international policy of the Americas. The motives are to an extent different ; the ends sought are the same. Both can exist and, I trust, will ever exist in all their vigor. . . . Pan- Americanism is an expression of the idea of internationalism. America has become the guardian of that idea, which will in the end rule the world. Pan-Americanism is the most advanced as well as the most practical form of that idea. It has been made possible because of our geographical isolation, of our similar political institu- tions, and of our common conception of human rights." 11 In a speech delivered before the Pan-American Financial Conference, which also met at Washington in 1915, Mr. John Bassett Moore declared that the idea of America's being not simply a geographical term, but a term representing a com- munity of interests, has existed so long that there is a fair presumption that it is not a term that misleads us, but a term that is thoroughly and persistently leading us in the right di- rection. Continuing, he said : " The word ' America,' be- io Scott, President Wilson's Foreign Policy, 129. 11 World Peace Foundation, Pamphlet Series, VI, 99-101. Digitized by Microsoft® 10 PAN-AMEPJCANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS ginning with the early part of the last century, during the struggles of our neighbors for independence, represented . the idea of a community of political interests, in which, as Henry Clay said, we should be regarded as standing together for the establishment of a human freedom league; and this idea has gradually advanced until to-day we are undertaking to estab- lish a community of interests with regard to all our activities. . . Identity of political interests we have had for many years. We now proceed to make the circuit complete by establishing the identity of our material interests on the broad basis of jus- tice, contentment, and good-fellowship." 12 In the introduction to his "Principles of American Di- plomacy," Mr. Moore makes the following important statement: " The idea of Pan- Americanism is obviously derived from the conception that there is such a thing as an American system; that this system is based upon distinctive interests which the American countries have in common ; and that it is independent of and different from the European system. To the extent to which Europe should become implicated in American politics, or to which American countries should become implicated in European politics, this distinction would necessarily be broken down, and the foundations of the American system would be impaired; and to the extent to which the foundations of the American system were impaired, Pan- Americanism would lose its vitality and the Monroe Doctrine its accustomed and tangible meaning." 13 The views of representative men of the other republics of the continent must now be considered ; for Pan-Americanism is not what only one of the American family of nations may con- ceive it to be. It is what the common opinion and the common action of all the states concerned make it. The government of Peru,, in replying to the invitation of the United States to take part in the first International American 12 Proceedings of the First Pan-American Financial Congress, 481. ia Moore, John Bassett, Principles of American Diplomacy, X. Digitized by Microsoft® MEANING OF PAN-AMERICANISM 11 Conference at Washington, declared that the idea of increasing and strengthening the honds which connect the American na- tions with each other, and in this way improving for the com- mon good the opportunities afforded by their geographical po- sition, and affording the union which nature itself created when it filled this continent with a galaxy of free, independent, vigorous, and youthful nations, was necessarily hailed by the government of Peru with feelings of sympathy and good will. 14 In the addresses made by the Hispanic-American delegates in the conference there also occur many expressions of a similar nature. It was not until some time later, however, that any- thing approximating a definition of Pan-Americanism was set forth by leading men of the Latin republics. In a report which the Argentine delegation made to the sec- ond International American Conference, it was declared: " In order that Pan- Americanism be not ... a mere thesis under discussion, and that the recommendations and the pro- fessions of principles may not remain idle words, it is necessary to descend from abstract heights, to conform ourself to the spirit of modern times, and to map out the great lines of a positive policy, inspired in justice, in equality, in territorial integrity, and in commercial relations, founded upon a compe- tition open to all." 15 A few months before the meeting of the third International American Conference at Rio de Janeiro, in 1906, a special ses- sion of the American Academy of Political and Social Science was held at Philadelphia in honor of Sefior don Joaquin D. Casasus, Mexican ambassador at Washington. The subject for discussion was the Pan-American conferences and their signifi- cance. Speaking of the tendency of nations, as time elapses, to meet more frequently in conferences and congresses for the pur- pose of avoiding conflicts, dissipating prejudices, reestablishing 1* Int. Am. Conf. (1889-90), I, 22. w Informs que la Delegaci&n Argentina Presenta a la Segunda Con- ferencia Pan-Americana, 3. Digitized by Microsoft® 12 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS peace, and for other similar purposes, Sefior Casastis declared that the labors of the Pan-American Conferences were for con- cord and peace; that they did not seek, like the Congress of Laibach or that of Vienna, to restore a form of government and authorize a nation to reconquer her colonies; that they were not inspired, as was the Congress of Panama, with the necessity of uniting the persecuted to resist the attacks of a common aggressor; but that they sought rather the union of all in common effort, and the establishment of a basis of peace by means of the amicable solution of international conflicts. 16 In an address which he made upon his election as per- manent president of the third International American Confer- ence, Senhor Nabuco, for many years Brazilian ambassador to the United States, declared that the aim of the conferences was intended to be the creation of an American opinion and of an American public spirit. He believed that they should never aim at forcing the opinion of a single one of the nations taking part in them ; that in no case should they intervene collectively in the affairs or interests that the various nations might wish to reserve for their own exclusive deliberation. " To us," he said, " it seems that the great object of these conferences should be to express collectively what is already understood to be unanimous, to unite, in the interval, between one and another what may already have completely ripened in the opinion of the continent, and to impart to it the power resulting from an accord amongst all American nations." 17 Two years later Senhor Nabuco declared on the occasion of the laying of the corner stone of the building of the Pan- American Union at Washington, that there had never been a parallel for the sight which that ceremony presented — " that of twenty-one nations, of different languages, building together a house for their common deliberations." Continuing, he said: ""Proceedings of Special Session of the Am. Acad, of Pol and Soc Science, February 24, 1906, 7. ir Int. Am. Conf. (1906), report of the delegates of the U. S. 57. Digitized by Microsoft® MEANING OF PAN-AMERICANISM 13 " The more impressive is the scene as these countries, with all possible differences between them in size and population, have established their union on the basis of the most absolute equal- ity. Here the vote of the smallest balances the vote of the greatest. So many sovereign states would not have been drawn so spontaneously and so strongly together, as if by irresistible force, if there did not exist throughout them, at the bottom or at the top of each national conscience, the feeling of a destiny common to all America." 1S At the opening session of the third International American Conference, the Brazilian statesman, Baron de Rio Branco, in adverting to the fact that the meeting of the conference might, perhaps, give rise to the suspicion that an international league against interests not represented was being formed, declared: " It is necessary therefore to affirm that, formally or im- plicitly, all interests will be respected by us ; that in the discus- sions of political and commercial subjects submitted for con- sideration to the conference it is not our intention to work against anybody, and that our sole aim is to bring about a closer union among American nations, to provide for their well-being and rapid progress ; and the accomplishment of these objects can only be. of advantage to Europe and the rest of the world." 19 At the special session of the third International American Conference held in honor of Mr. Root, to which reference has been made above, Senor Cornejo, a delegate for Peru, made in the course of a short address the following remarks: " These congresses, gentlemen, are the symbol of that soli- darity which, notwithstanding the ephemeral passions of men, constitutes, by the invincible force of circumstances, the essence of our continental system. They were conceived by the organ- izing genius of the statesmen of Washington in order that the American sentiment of patriotism might be therein exalted, is Pan-American Union Bulletin,, May, 1908. i»Int. Am, Con. (1906), report of the delegates of the U. S., 56. Digitized by Microsoft® 14 PAW-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS freeing it from that national egotism which may be justified in the difficult moments of the formation of states, but which would be to-day an impediment to the development of the Amer- ican idea, destined to demonstrate that just as the democratic principle has been to combine liberty and order in the consti- tution of states, it will likewise combine the self-government of the nations and fraternity in the relations of the peoples." 20 On the occasion of Mr. Root's visit to Uruguay, the president, Sefior Battle y Ordonez, said in the course of an address that America will be the continent of a just peace, founded on the respect for the rights of all nations, a respect as great for the weakest nations as for the most vast and most powerful em- pires. A Pan-American public opinion would be created and made effective, he thought, by systematizing international con- duct with a view to suppressing injustice, and to establishing amongst the nations ever more and more profoundly cordial relations. Continuing, he declared that the Pan-American conferences were destined to become a modern Amphictyon to whose decisions all the great American questions would be submitted. Dr. Luis M. Drago, the well-known Argentine publicist, au- thor of the Drago doctrine, speaking on the occasion of Mr. Root's visit to Buenos Aires, said: " Enlightened patriotism has understood at last that in this continent, with its immense riches and vast, unexplored exten- sions, power and wealth are not to be looked for in conquest and displacement, but in collaboration and solidarity, which will people the wilderness and give the soil to the plow. It has understood, however, that America, by reason of the na- tionalities of which it is composed, of the nature of the repre- sentative institutions which they have adopted, by the very character of their peoples, separated as they have been from the conflicts and complications of European governments and even by the gravitation of peculiar circumstances and wants, 20 Root, Latin America and the V. 8., Addresses, 12. Digitized by Microsoft® MEANING OF PAN-AMERICANISM 15 has been constituted a separate political factor, a new and vast theater for the development of the human race, which will serve as a counterpoise to the great civilizations of the other hemisphere, and so maintain the equilibrium of the world." 21 In 1910, at the opening session of the fourth International American Conference, the Argentine Minister of Foreign Af- fairs, Dr. V. de la Plaza, said : " It had come to be the inveterate custom of the powers to deliberate among themselves on the destinies of incipient and weak nations, as if dealing with states or sovereignties pos- sessing neither voice nor weight in the control and develop- ment of the rules, principles, and declarations inherent in hu- man societies, recognized as independent and sovereign in their international relations. This condition of precarious autonomy and liberty of action, and the constant danger of being sub- jugated or of suffering the mutilation of their territory, would have continued among these weak states but for the wise and famous declaration of President Monroe, to which we ought to render due homage; and but for the constant action of other continental powers of somewhat greater strength in the defense of their territory and sovereignties as well as their declared in- tention to cooperate for the protection of those states which were endowed with less strength and fewer means of self- defense." 22 The foregoing statements made by responsible men in public life in the Hispanic American republics may be fairly con- sidered as representative of the best thought in that section of the continent. It is not to be inferred, however, that unanim- ity of opinion exists. On the contrary there is much diversity and not a few writers of more or less note, and occasionally men in public life advocate a closer union of the Hispanic states for the purpose of resisting the threatening (as they believe) encroachments of the United States. These views 21 Root, Latin America and the U. 8., Addresses, 95. 22 Int. Am. Oonf. ( 1910) , report of the delegates of the U. S., 46. Digitized by Microsoft® 16 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS need not be discussed at length. A bare reference to two or three of the best-known writers of this group will suffice. A Illusao Americana by a Brazilian, Eduardo Prado, is typical. Appearing some three decades ago, soon after the establishment of the Brazilian republic, this book expressed great skepticism respecting the fraternity of the American nations in general, and manifested particularly a hostile spirit toward the tendency of the Hispanic republics to establish more intimate relations with the United States. More recently an Argentine writer, Manuel Ugarte, has gained an extensive notoriety by his propa- ganda against Pan-Americanism. His ideas are set forth in a book which he published in 1911 under the title of El Porvenir de la America Latina. Finally, an article by Jacinto Lopez on what he calls Monroismo y Pwrv-Americanismo, appearing in Cuba Contempordnea for April, 1916, may be taken as repre- sentative of the more serious adverse criticisms which have in recent years been made in Hispanic American periodicals. Monroeism, according to this writer, means empire, and Pan- Americanism is the mask of imperialism. The significance of Monroeism, he thinks, is clear; but Pan- Americanism is am- biguous, incomprehensible, susceptible of all sorts of interpre- tations. The remedy for the situation, in Lopez's opinion, is to be found in the union of Hispanic Am erican states as a coun- terpoise to the preponderant influence of the United States. On the other hand such opinions are offset by those of other Hispanic American writers and publicists who in a private ca- pacity maintain and justify the existence of Pan-Americanism. Alejandro Alvarez, a Chilean publicist, viewing the subject from the historical standpoint, is of the opinion that the notion of international solidarity is essentially American and that it manifested itself in most brilliant fashion in the struggle of the Spanish colonies for independence. This sense of unity which existed between the belligerent Spanish colonies was, he be- lieves, different in its origin and in its manifestations from the sentiment of international fraternity about which certain of the Digitized by Microsoft® MEANING OF PAN-AMEKICANISM 17 eighteenth-century philosophers had written. The sentiment, however, according to Alvarez, did not develop between the new Spanish American nations and Brazil, because there was no common action in the struggle for independence. When Brazil became an empire in 1822, it was still regarded as semi-Euro- pean. Between the new Spanish American powers and the United States, on the other hand, there existed a solidarity, different, it is true, from the other, but no less effective. That soli- darity, though it did not yet embrace Brazil, was, according to Alvarez, Pan-American. It had its basis in the fact that the struggling colonies were in the same continent with the United States; that the United States had a few years before conducted a similar struggle to achieve its freedom; that it furnished a model for the political institutions of the new states; and that it could establish economic relations with the new nations with greater facility than with the countries of Europe. 23 What Alvarez calls Latin American solidarity — that is the unity of the Spanish-speaking states with Brazil — did not develop, according to his view, until about the middle of the nineteenth century. It was then brought about by the identity of political and international problems with which the Latin states were all alike confronted. Thus, according to this writer, there are three phases of American solidarity — Spanish Amer- ican, Pan-American, and Latin American, which developed in the order named. 24 Some further views of Senor Alvarez will be noted below. In Cuba Contempordnea for October, 1916, there was pub- lished a lengthy article on Pan-Americanism by the well-known Peruvian writer, Erancisco Garcia Oalderon. The following extracts will give a fair idea of his conception of Pan-Ameri- canism : « La Diplomacia de Chile, 65. 24 Alvarez, Droit International Americain, 245. Digitized by Microsoft® 18 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS " The likeness of peoples whom a doctrine and a policy strive to unite is not always complete. They may differ in religion as is the case with the diverse dominions of the Slavs, or the different provinces of German speech. The systems of govern- ment of the Spaniards of the Old and of the New World are diverse as also is the case with Saxons of the Monarchical Island and the [Republican Continent. Among the immense number of Slavs the creed, the language, the customs, and po- litical order vary ; and yet they are moved by a common spirit. In America, unity is geographical and moral. Republicanism, liberalism, democracy, tolerance, constitute from north to south aspects of a common social gospel. Germanized Saxons and Latinized Spaniards succeed in denning similar aspirations and aversions. Though the North American is Protestant and the Ibero-American is Catholic; though they speak different lan- guages and respond to a different logic, yet they derive from like lands, from a uniform system of government, from a growth free from secular traditions, from the absence of rigid castes, from a community of generous principles, such as arbitration and the love of peace, and from general enterprises of utility, an active Pan-Americanism, theory and militant reality, prac- tical crusade and romantic apostleship. " It is not, as in the book of Mr. Stead, 25 a plan for the Americanization of the southern continent, a mask for pacific penetration. Whoever defines this international system fixes its characteristics in free competition, and in organization based upon harmonious wills, and closer relations of peoples who neither obey the command of a despotic overlord, nor renounce, upon associating, a strong spirit of nationalism. Although in the history of the last century violence frequently prevailed over union and the expansion of the strongest was transformed into conquest, yet upon the development of a Pan-American ambition the United States announces that the era of unjust policy is at an end and that in the new moral federation con- s' W. T. Stead, The Americanization of the World. Digitized by Microsoft® MEANING OF PAN-AMEKICANISM 19 sent is an essential virtue. ... In ideal Pan-Americanism, free from ancient appetites, fraternal republics construct an economic and moral association, formulate aspirations for lib- erty and for peace which will affect continents grown old in wars of spoliation and slavery." The views of a sufficient number of representative men of both North and South America have now been set forth to show whether or not there is a consensus of opinion as to the general characteristics of Pan-Americanism. Before any at- tempt is made, however, to deduce from these particulars and from the pertinent facts of international American relations a concise description of Pan- Americanism, it is indispensable to inquire into a point about which there is some difference of opinion ; namely, the doctrine of equality as applied to certain of the republics of this hemisphere. In this question is in- volved the position of the United States in the American fam- ily of nations. The equality of nations as a principle of international law is not universally accepted. Lorimer, for example, says: " Men are not and never will be, equal : their equalization is not within the reach of human will ; and as the inequalities of classes and the inequalities of states are the direct and neces- sary results of the inequalities of individuals, they are equally certain and equally permanent. However fondly the dream of equality may be cherished by the envious or the vain, whether it be manifested as an individual or a natural aspiration, it is a chimera as unrealizable as the union of the head of a woman and the tail of a fish." But he goes on to say that " To the same category of absolute impossibilities belong all schemes which, in this changing world, assume as existing, or seek to establish, permanent relations of superiority or inferiority, whether between individuals, or classes, or states, in place of accepting as their basis the facts presented by the contemporary history of mankind." 26 26 Institutes of the Law of Nations, II, 193, Digitized by Microsoft® 20 PAN-AMEBICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS The weight of opinion, however, from Grotius to the present time supports the doctrine of equality. Phillipson, in a recent edition of Wheaton, says that sovereign states possessing legal personality as members of the society of nations enjoy equal- ity before international law; but that from the political point of view it cannot be said that all the states of the world are equal. "In Europe the concert of the six great powers, and on the American continent the United States," he says, " exer- cise a leadership which, in each case, is real and possesses the greatest weight, though it is not determined by definite rules." 27 Westlake, one of the profoundest of recent writers on inter- national law, says on the subject of the political inequality of states in Europe that " when a matter arises, and the states which are agreed as to the mode of dealing with it carry their plan into effect as far as it is possible to do so by their own action, without directly compelling a state which does not agree with them to join in their action and without directly affecting that state, they do not violate its independence. But their ac- tion may indirectly compel that state to join in it, or to endure without opposition a conduct which it deems to affect it in- juriously though indirectly, or of which it disapproves in the general interest of the European system. In that case a po- litical victory has been gained over the state in question. And a state may be so weak that it is not much or at all consulted by the other powers, and that little attention is paid to its opinion, if given. In that case it is in a position of political inferiority, and many states of the European system are per- manently in such a situation toward what are called the great powers, yet their equality is not necessarily infringed thereby." 28 Declaring that at no time in no quarter of the globe can small states ever have been admitted by large ones to political equality with themselves, Westlake reviews the control of Euro- 27 Wheaton's Elements of International Law, 261. as Collected Papers, 92. Digitized by Microsoft® MEANING OF PAN-AMERICANISM 21 pean affairs during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries hy the great powers, and reaches the conclusion that a certain sort of political inequality is compatible in the European system with legal equality. This fact he thinks is not one to he con- demned ; for it may prove to be a step toward the establishment of a European government, and in no society, he holds, can peace and order be permanently enjoyed without a government. If, then, such political inequality as has long subsisted in Europe is not incompatible with legal equality — equality be- fore international law — it follows that in the American fam- ily of nations political inequality, if it exists, is not incom- patible with legal equality. It will be remarked that Westlake makes no specific reference to the American situation. Law- rence points out the disparity in strength and influence be- tween the United States and any other power in the Western Hemisphere, and he accords to this republic because of its pre- ponderant strength and influence a position in America sim- ilar to that occupied in Europe by the great powers. But he is careful to point out differences, the most important of which is that the United States is not called upon in the exercise of its primacy to dictate territorial arrangements with a view to maintaining a shifting balance of power. 29 This difference is so fundamental and the preponderant influence of the United States is exercised in a manner so different from the way in which the European concert is made effective, that the com- parison between the two systems is hardly valid. The marks of contrast are rather more striking. In 1895 there occurred an incident which led not a few observers to believe that the United States contemplated the assertion of its preponderant influence to such an extent as to reduce the less powerful American states to a species of vassalage. Reference is made to the intervention of the Cleve- land administration in the boundary dispute between Great Britain and Venezuela. It was on this occasion that Secre- ts Prindplea of International Law, 242. Digitized by Microsoft® 22 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS tary of State Olney declared in his instructions of July 20, 1895, to Mr. Bayard, the American ambassador at London, that " To-day the United States is practically sovereign on this continent, and its fiat is law upon subjects to which it confines its interposition " ; 30 and that President Cleveland in his mes- sage to Congress on December 17, 1895, affirmed that, " If the balance of power is justly a cause for jealous anxiety among the governments of the Old World and a subject for our abso- lute noninterference, none the less is an observance of the Mon- roe Doctrine of vital concern to our people and their govern- ment." 31 The statement of Secretary Olney, standing alone, is per- haps susceptible of such an interpretation as was, for example, given to it by The Nation to the effect that it was " the first assertion of sovereignty over the whole Western Hemisphere since the Pope's Bull, and, of course, makes us responsible for all wrong-doing from Canada to Cape Horn." 32 And the words of President Cleveland, quoted above, give color to the assumption that it was desired to have the United States oc- cupy a position in the Western Hemisphere similar to that occupied by the great powers in Europe. Such criticisms were not confined to the United States. In discussing a resolution defining the Monroe Doctrine which had been introduced into the United States Congress as a result of the Anglo- Venezuelan boundary agitation, the London Times, in its issue of January 22, 1896, says that it was understood that some of the South American republics had expressed themselves decidedly against the proposed definition, which they considered would impair their independence and reduce them to a condition of vassalage to the United States. The Paris Temps strongly expressed a similar opinion in the interests of the minor American com- munities, while entering at the same time an emphatic protest 30 Foreign Rel. of the U. S., 1895, 558. 31 Id., 543. 32LXI, 459. Digitized by Microsoft® MEANING OF PAN-AMERICANISM 23 in the name of Europe against what it called " the moral an- nexation, pure and simple, of the two continents of the West- ern Hemisphere." 3S If these critics had paid heed to Secretary Olney's instruc- tions as a whole, their criticisms, no doubt, would have been less severe. After making the declaration that to-day the United States is practically sovereign on this continent, Mr. Olney goes on to explain what he means. " It is not," he said, " because of the pure friendship or good will felt for it. It is not simply by reason of its high character as a civilized state, nor because wisdom and justice and equity are the in- variable characteristics of the dealings of the United States. It is because in addition to all other grounds, its infinite re- sources combined with its isolated position render it master of the situation and practically invulnerable as against any or all other powers. All the advantages of this superiority are at once imperiled if the principle be admitted that European pow- ers may convert American states into colonies or provinces of their own." 34 Moreover, Mr. Olney expressly disclaimed any intention on the part of the United States to interfere in the internal affairs of the other American republics. The Monroe Doctrine, he said, " Does not establish any general protectorate by the United States over the other American states. . . . The rule in ques- tion has but a single purpose and object. It is that no Euro- pean power or combination of powers shall forcibly deprive an American state of the right and power of self-government and of shaping for itself its own political fortunes and destinies." 3B Subsequently the relations of the United States with Cuba and certain other republics in the region of the Caribbean have led to renewed discussion. According to Phillipson, 36 Cuba, since the treaty of June 12, 1901, by which the island was 33 Cf. also Des Jardins in Revue General de Droit Int. Public, III, 159. si For. Bel. of the V. 8., 1895, 558. 35 For. Bel. of the V. 8., 1895, 554. 36 Wheaton'8 Elements of Int. Law, 63. Digitized by Microsoft® 24 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS made over to the Cuban people, has occupied, with respect to the United States, a position which " seems " to bring it within the category of international protectorates. Though it man- ages its own internal and external affairs, it is precluded from entering into any treaty with a foreign power which might endanger its independence; and it undertakes to contract no debt for which the current revenue will not suffice, and to con- cede to the United States the right of intervention to preserve Cuban independence, to maintain a government adequate for the protection of life, property, and individual liberty, and the right to use its harbors as naval stations. Phillipson, however, calls attention to the fact that as con- ditions are at present, there does not appear to be unanimity of opinion as to the precise international status of the republic. Benton, for example, in his International Law and Diplomacy of the Spanish-American War, holds that it is a fully sover- eign state, and Whitcomb, in La Situacion International de Cuba, maintains that it is a semi-sovereign state. But even admitting that the weak constitutional tie by which Cuba is bound to the United States has the effect of reducing it to the status of semi-sovereignty, yet since other states accept it as being sovereign and independent, its equality remains unim- paired ; that is, the identity of rights and obligations for all is admitted; which is merely to say that the international law which they recognize is a body of general rules and not of par- ticular solutions. 37 In his fifth annual message, communicated to Congress De- cember 5, 1905, President Eoosevelt discussed the relations of the United States with the Dominican Republic, which may be taken as a case typical of these weaker republics. Eor a number of years conditions in that republic had been growing from bad to worse, until finally, according to Roosevelt, society was on the verge of dissolution. Fortunately, however, a ruler sprang up who, with his colleagues, saw the dangers threatening "Westlake, Collected Papers, 89. Digitized by Microsoft® MEANING OF PAN-AMERICANISM 25 their country and appealed to the friendship of the United States. There was imminent danger of foreign intervention. The previous rulers of Santo Domingo had recklessly incurred debts; and, owing to internal disorders, the republic had been unable to provide means to meet its obligations. Roosevelt had accordingly negotiated a treaty under which the United States undertook to help the Dominican people rehabilitate their finance by taking charge of and administering their custom- houses. The treaty at the time this message was sent to Con- gress was pending before the Senate. An intervention such as the President had been foreshadowing in his previous mes- sages had at last taken place. And in his message of December 5, giving an account of it to the Congress, he said : " We must recognize the fact that in South American coun- tries there has been much suspicion lest we should interpret the Monroe Doctrine as in some way inimical to their interests, and we must try to convince all the other nations of this con- tinent once and for all that no just and orderly government has anything to fear from us. There are certain republics to the south of us which have already reached such a point of sta- bility, order, and prosperity that they themselves, though as yet hardly consciously, are among the guarantors of this doc- trine. These republics we now meet not only on a basis of entire equality, but in a spirit of frank and respectful friend- ship, which we hope is mutual. . . . Under the proposed treaty the independence of the island is scrupulously respected, the danger of the violation of the Monroe Doctrine by the interven- tion of foreign powers vanishes, and the interference of our government is minimized, so that we shall only act in conjunc- tion with the Santo Domingo authorities to secure the proper administration of the customs, and therefore to secure the pay- ment of just debts and to secure the Dominican Government from demands for unjust debts." 38 This treaty failed of rati- fication; but a new one was concluded and ratified in 1907. as The Works of Theodore Roosevelt, IV, 607. Digitized by Microsoft® 26 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS In the addresses which he delivered on his South American trip in 1913, Mr. Eoosevelt made statements which clearly in- dicate a classification of the American states in two categories: those enjoying political equality with the United States and those politically inferior. He nowhere says or implies, of course, that all American states do not enjoy legal equality. This difference must be kept in mind in interpreting his re- marks. In an address delivered at Bio de Janeiro, he said, in speaking of the Monroe Doctrine, that " all of the American nations which are sufficiently advanced, such as Brazil and the United States, should participate on an absolute equality in the responsibility and development of this doctrine, as far as the interests of the Western Hemisphere as a whole are con- cerned." 39 At Buenos Aires he declared that certain of the Hispanic American nations had grown with astonishing speed to a posi- tion of assured and orderly political development, material prosperity, readiness to do justice to others, and potential strength to enforce justice from others. " Every such na- tion," he continued, " when once it has achieved such a posi- tion, should become itself a sponsor and guarantor of the doc- trine; and its relations with the other sponsors and guarantors should be those of equality." i0 In Chile, Roosevelt declared that relations between certain Hispanic American countries, among which he included Chile, were based on exact equality of right and mutuality of respect. 41 Representative of the best Hispanic American opinion on this subject are the views of Dr. Emilio Frers, who on the occasion of Mr. Roosevelt's visit to Buenos Aires in 1913 ad- mitted the political inequality of certain American states with- out conceding the right of the United States to intervene in the 39 The Outlook, CV, 474. 40 Frers, American Ideals, 23. 4i Souvenir of the Visit of Colonel Roosevelt to Chile 47. Digitized by Microsoft® MEANING OF PAN-AMERICANISM 27 affairs of those states either for their own good or in the inter- ests of the American republics in general. He said : " The nations of Latin America will not feel at their ease so long as they do not rest in the security that no master may arise for them either from within or from without, and that no one, no matter where he may come from, may place in dan- ger their integrity or their independence and sovereignty. The sentiment of nationality and of independence is so deeply rooted and is so exalted among these nations, that it perhaps consti- tutes the dominant feature of their patriotism. . . . Fortu- nately there are now many states in South America which have well implanted institutions and which have fully entered upon an orderly and constitutional life. The Argentine republic, among them, may rest in the confidence of its own advances. . . . But her origin and her history inevitably bind her to the other Spanish American nations, and if, perchance, her people feel inclined to recognize the necessity of imposing peace and civilization on those who are fulfilling a less happy destiny than hers, I do not think it would sympathize with the idea of acknowledging the right of rich and powerful nations to rise up in self -constituted authority and judgment over the weaker and more disorderly nations, or to impose penalties upon them, even though it be for their offenses against civilization." Dr. Frers foreshadowed a possible solution of the difficulty in the following words : " Perhaps it may not be difficult to find the solution which is inevitably produced whenever turbu- lent or disorderly states commit offenses against civilization and expose the prestige of the entire continent. Perhaps in a more or less distant future some high authority may be con- stituted which shall have jurisdiction in these questions of offenses against civilization, which may settle such questions with absolute impartiality, and which may acquire confidence and establish peace. The undeniable fact is that some means must be sought for to resolve these conflicts between the right Digitized by Microsoft® 28 PAN-AMEKICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS to independence and autonomy and the supreme right of Amer- ican civilization which must be defended as the common heritage of the New World." 42 With a brief reference to the views of Dr. Alejandro Al- varez, the eminent Chilean authority, this discussion must be brought to a close. According to Dr. Alvarez 43 the first part of the Monroe message of 1823 contained an implicit recogni- tion of the political equality of all the states of the New World and consequently the negation of the right of one state to in- tervene in the affairs of the others. But this idea, Alvarez affirms, has not been adhered to by the United States, espe- cially since the development of its hegemony, which he defines as the exercise by the United States of preponderance when its interests are involved. Calling attention to the fact that the policy of hegemony applies almost exclusively to the countries in the neighborhood of the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea, Alvarez declares that the policy is the inevitable fruit of the prodigious and rapid development of the United States and of its great terri- torial, economic and maritime superiority, compared with the other American republics. What has contributed to its success is the fact that it is always presented as the logical consequence of the Monroe Doctrine, and the powerful states, far from op- posing it, have always respected it. It is interesting to note, says Alvarez, that in certain cases where the Monroe Doctrine might have been applied it was not invoked, and that frequently it is invoked as an act of hegemony, in order to make it appear as being founded in a traditional policy, generally accepted. It is for this reason that publicists seldom distinguish between the one policy and the other ; that is, between the Monroe Doc- trine and hegemony. Alvarez maintains that the hegemony of the United States takes two distinct forms, corresponding to different situations. *2 American Ideals, 15. a Droit Int. Am.., 136. Digitized by Microsoft® MEANING OF PAN-AMERICANISM 29 The first he calls a policy of the maintenance, application, and development of the Monroe Doctrine. In this form of the policy the United States voices the needs and aspirations of the^ whole of America. Under the second form the policy becomes personal; that is, it becomes a policy (1) aimed at assuring the^' preponderance of the United States in the New World, and (2) a policy of intervention in the affairs of certain Latin American states. Recognizing the benefits which the American republics have derived from the hegemony of the United States as well as from the Monroe Doctrine, Alvarez raises the question whether it might not be better for both policies to be maintained by the active cooperation of all the American states. He thinks he is able to note in recent events a tendency in this direction. It may be said in passing that the supremacy which the United States enjoys in the Western Hemisphere by virtue of its preponderant strength and influence and which it main- tains under the Monroe Doctrine, cannot be in any historical sense of the word properly denominated hegemony. The hege- mony of Athens was imperialistic. Athens stood in the rela- tion of sovereign to certain members of the Delian League. The league was not one of equal states. And if in the Pelo- ponnesian confederation the states were equal, the hegemony of Sparta was military in its nature. Its leadership was exer- cised for the purpose of waging war more effectively upon other states. And finally the supremacy of Prussia in the Ger- man Confederation, to which the term has often been applied, was wholly different from the position of the United States in the American family of nations. Though admitting that the United States is preponderant, it is undoubtedly misleading to call its preponderance hegemony. It is better, therefore, to avoid the term unless a definite meaning such as that given to it by Alvarez in his Droit International Americain be agreed upon. And even then its two aspects, as denned by him, are likely to lead to confusion. The attempt must now be made to deduce from this lengthy Digitized by Microsoft® 30 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS discussion a description of Pan-Americanism as exact and as concise as the nature of the conception will permit. It has al- ready been found that the lexicographers do not agree among themselves as to the precise meaning of the term. Indeed it may well be doubted whether an adequate definition per genus et differentia is possible. As genus none of the terms employed — principle, advocacy, idea, sentiment, aspiration, tendency, doctrine — satisfies the logical and inquiring mind as to what the real nature of Pan-Americanism is. And even though the genus were agreed upon the differentiae of these set definitions would still fail to describe the concept in a manner sufficiently explicit. A choice from among the various descriptions given by statesmen and publicists would be but little more satisfactory. Mr. Lansing calls Pan- Americanism an international policy of the Americas. Now a policy may be defined as a course of action adopted and pursued, or intended to be pursued, by a government, party, ruler, statesmen, or by some nonpolitical body or by an individual. If Pan-Americanism is a policy, what is the body which adopts and pursues the course of action which makes it effective ? Evidently it cannot be a policy with- out such a formulating and directing force. Does the Interna- tional Union of American Republics, formed in 1890, consti- tute such a body ? It is with the greatest difficulty that it may be so conceived. The course of action which this union adopts in its periodical conferences, and which it pursues through the agency of its bureau at Washington and through the activity of the separate governments, is extremely limited in scope. But supposing that it were not so limited, the question would arise whether or not, according to this conception, Pan-Ameri- canism existed prior to 1890. Evidently it could not be an international policy of the Americas until some international American body had adopted it as an appropriate course of ac- tion. The separate action of the American states could not make it an international policy. The ineffective international conferences which now and then took place from 1826 to 1889 Digitized by Microsoft® MEANING OF PAN-AMEKIOANISM 31 between some of the American states could not make it such a policy. Was it something other than a policy, if it existed at all, prior to the meeting of the first International Am erican Conference? That Pan-Americanism was brought into exist- ence through the action of the representatives of the Am erican states who met at Washington in 1889 is not a tenable proposi- tion. It was in existence, at least in its beginnings, long be- fore the Washington conference took place. As Ambassador Nabuco put it, the conferences merely express collectively what is already felt to be unanimous. There is another way of viewing the matter which may help to dissipate the confusion. Cornejo, in the address cited above, speaks of " our continental system " ; Drago conceives of Amer- ica as constituting a " separate political factor " ; and Moore states that " Pan- Americanism is obviously derived from the conception that there is such a thing as an American system." This conception of America as a separate political entity is not new. Monroe declared in his famous message that " it is im- possible that the allied powers should extend their political system to any portion of either continent without endangering our peace and happiness, nor can any one believe that our southern brethren, if left to themselves, would adopt it of their own accord." And two years and a half before Monroe made his declaration Henry Clay said on the floor of Congress : " It is in our power to create a system of which we shall be the center, and in which all South America will act with us. . . . We should become the center of a system which would consti- tute the rallying point of human wisdom against all the des- potism of the Old World." 44 It will be recalled that Lawrence compared the primacy of the United States in the New World to the primacy of the great powers in the Old. 45 As has already been pointed out <* Moore, Henry Clay and Pan-Americanism, in Columbia Univ. Quar., Sept., 1915, 351. 45 principles of Int. Law, 242, Digitized by Microsoft® 32 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS the differences between the two are so great as to destroy, prac- tically, the validity of the comparison. But a view of the European system may help to determine the nature of Pan- Americanism. Von Gentz, writing in 1806, conceived of the balance of power as "'a constitution subsisting between neigh- boring states, more or less connected with one another, by vir- tue of which no one among them can injure the independence or essential rights of another." 46 Fenelon even considered the whole of Christendom as " a kind of universal republic " all the members of which owed it to one another, for the common good, to prevent the progress of any other members who should seek to overthrow the balance existing between them. 47 West- lake has the same idea in mind with regard to the balance of power when he speaks of it as possibly being a step toward the establishment of a European government. And Lorimer con- siders the balance of power as an indirect solution of what he called the ultimate problem in international law; that is, how to find the international equivalents known to national law as legislation, jurisdiction, and execution. 48 In short, these authorities consider the balance of power as a political system constituting the beginnings of an international government. Now if the American nations constitute a separate political factor in relation to the rest of the world, their political sys- tem may be regarded as a step — and nothing more than a step — toward an international American government. But a step toward government implies a step toward constitution, for constitution, however vague and ill-defined, is necessary for the guidance of government. By constitution is meant a collection of principles according to which the powers of government, and the rights of the governed and the relations between the govern- ment and the governed, are adjusted. It may have no outward *« Taylor, Treatise on, Int. Public Law, 98. *ilbid., 99. *s Institutes of Int. Law, II, 193. Digitized by Microsoft® MEANING OF PAN-AMERICANISM 33 form of expression further than is given by precedents and habits of political action. 49 It cannot be said that the progress thus far achieved has pro- duced any clearly denned organ of government. The Inter- national Conferences of American Republics may be considered as such an organ only in the vaguest and most tenuous sense of the term. But back of this organization lies a moral union of American states founded upon a body of principles growing out of the common struggle for independence. It is to this body of principles that we must turn for the meaning of Pan- Americanism. They are: 1. Independence. Not merely nominal independence with Old World attachments remaining; but independence in the sense of complete political separation, American states neither interfering in the affairs of the European powers nor allowing those powers to interfere in their own affairs. These princi- ples, first formally proclaimed by Washington in his farewell address and by Monroe in his message of 1823, subsequently received, by tacit assent and by express governmental action, the sanction of the Hispanic American states. The establish- ment of the League of Nations tends rather to confirm than to invalidate this principle. 2. Community of Political Ideals. The fact that the Amer- ican states are all republics is not so much the bond of union between them, as the fact that they all cherish common political ideals. It is the spirit of their governments rather than their form which serves to bring them together. It is not likely that if Brazil had continued as a constitutional monarchy the prog- ress of Pan-Americanism would have been seriously retarded. 3. Territorial Integrity. The states of this hemisphere re- gard the principle of conquest as inadmissible in American public law. The uti possidetis of 1810 was generally adopted as a rule for the settlement of the boundary questions between *» Woolsey, Political Science, I, 284. Digitized by Microsoft® 34 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGIIOINGS the new states, and while the application of the rule has given rise to numerous international conflicts, and important cessions of territory have been made as a result of wars growing out of other causes, the spirit of conquest has not generally prevailed among the American states. The repeated declarations of the United States to the effect that it neither covets the territory of its neighbors nor seeks to aggrandize itself by conquest, give additional sanction to the rule. Roosevelt, December 3, 1901 ; Root, July 31, 1906; Knox, February 28 and March 6, 1912; Wilson, October 27, 1913 ; Lansing, December 27, 1915. 4. Law Instead of Force. The American states rely upon law and amicable adjustments to settle their international diffi- culties rather than upon force. In their international confer- ences action is taken by unanimous consent. As far as con- cerns itself, every state is left free to interpose a negative to whatever measure it may consider prejudicial to its interests. This device of requiring unanimous consent has tended to pre- vent the development of the idea of the balance of power in this continent. The system of voting by the absolute majority tends to the formation of two groups more or less evenly divided along sectional or economic lines, and this in turn tends to the formation of a balance of power. Moreover, if the will of the majority is to prevail, it must be supported by force. Unan- imous consent precludes the use of force. Although this rule has had definite application only since the organization of the Pan-American Conferences, it has prevailed none the less in spirit from the beginning. 5. Nonintervention. Believing that " every nation has the right to independence in the sense that it has the right to the pursuit of happiness and is free to develop itself without inter- ference or control from other states," 50 the American powers have never, as a body, undertaken to intervene in the affairs of any particular state or states. There has been in recent years M American Journal of Int. Law, X, 213. Digitized by Microsoft® MEANING OF PAN-AMERICANISM 35 a tendency toward the joint use of good offices, but no tendency toward dictatorial interference. 6. Equality. The American powers not only recognize the principle of the equality of states under international law, but in the conduct of their international union they observe it to the fullest extent, presenting in this respect a striking contrast to the Concert of Europe. Only the great powers are admitted to the European conferences on a basis of equality. On the other hand all the American states are admitted to the Amer- ican conferences, and the vote of the weakest republic has as much weight as that of the most powerful. The political in- equality of certain American states gives rise to the exercise by the United States of international police power; but this is an individual policy of the United States and not Pan-American. 7. Cooperation. The American states, forming a separate political system, a distinct family of nations, entertaining the same political ideals, cooperate in a spirit of fraternal friend- ship, in the promotion of their common interests, whether these be political, economic, or cultural. These principles may indeed be considered as bases of the constitution of what, by the free choice of all concerned, may develop into an international American government. Taken together with the whole mass of precedents and habits of polit- ical acting which have emerged from the international relations of the states of the Western Hemisphere, they constitute the particulars from which, by a process of generalization, the abstract concept Pan-Americanism is derived. Digitized by Microsoft® CHAPTER II FORMATION OF NEW STATES The intervention of Napoleon in the affairs of Spain in 1808 marks the beginning of a series of events of the highest importance to the Western Hemisphere. The resistance of the Spanish people to the rule of Joseph Bonaparte, whom the emperor had placed on the throne of Spain in place of Ferdi- nand VII, was reflected in a movement on this side of the Atlantic, which, evolving through different phases, finally cul- minated in the independence of the vast expanse of Spanish territory extending from Mexico to Buenos Aires. And the flight of the Portuguese prince regent, John, afterward King John VI, with his court to Brazil, to escape the fate which had overtaken the Spanish king, proved to be the first step toward the conversion of that wide domain into an independent em- pire. By the end of the year 1824 the process of emancipation was about complete, though there was still much to be done in the way of the political organization of the nascent states. The transformation in Brazil was rapid, and the establishment of an independent government was for obvious reasons relatively easy. The residence of the Portuguese court at Bio de Janeiro for a considerable length of time, and the elevation of the col- ony in 1815 to the rank of a kingdom coordinate with that of Portugal, had already given Brazil a consciousness of its virtual independence. The return of John VI, therefore, to Portugal in 1821, leaving his son, Dom Pedro, as regent in Brazil, was quickly followed by the complete severing of the slight bonds which still held the two kingdoms together. The year follow- ing the king's departure, independence was formally declared 36 Digitized by Microsoft® FORMATION OP NEW STATES 37 and Pedro was proclaimed " Constitutional Emperor and Per- petual Defender of Brazil." * The opposition which the Por- tuguese forces in the country interposed to the assertion of inde- pendence was so insignificant that the revolution was accom- plished almost without Woodshed. The young empire was thus permitted to enter at once upon the undisturbed enjoyment of its freedom. The Spanish colonies, on the other hand, achieved their in- dependence only after long and bitter warfare. It was not un- til the victory of Ayacucho was won in the mountains of Peru on December 9, 1824, that the outcome of the struggle was defi- nitely assured. Being driven, as an immediate consequence of that battle, from the Andean plateau where they were making a last stand, the Royalist forces were reduced to the possession of a mere foothold in southern Chile, of the fortresses of Callao, in Peru, and of San Juan de Ulua in Mexico. These they were soon to be forced also to relinquish ; San Juan de Ulua in September, 1825, and the other places in January of the following year. While these great changes were occurring on the mainland, the island colonies of Cuba and Porto Rico had likewise been stirred by the spirit of revolution, but their at- tempts at independence failed and they were destined to remain under Spanish rule till the intervention of the United States in behalf of Cuba three quarters of a century later. On the other hand, the French colony of St. Domingue, later the republic of Haiti, met with a wholly different result. If not the first of the revolting colonies to establish beyond per- adventure its independence, it was at least the first to declare it formally, its declaration being made in 1804, 2 whereas the i This title was later sanctioned by the constitution which was put into effect in 1824. Of. Carvahlo Moreira, Constitucao do Imperio do Brasil, 45. A translation into Spanish of the constitution of 1824 is found in Arosemena, Estudios constitudonales sobre loa gobiernos de la America Latino., I, 1-27 (2nd ed.) A French translation is found in British and Foreign State Papers, XIII, 936-958. 2 The declaration was signed and proclaimed by Dessalines, the leader Digitized by Microsoft® 38, PAN-AMEKICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS first of the formal declarations upon the part of the Spanish colonies was made seven years later. Considering the ignorance of the mass of the population and its lack of experience in self- government, it is not to he wondered at that the political organ- ization of this new state was accomplished with great difficulty. Years of disorder and of frightful excesses followed the separa- tion from France. Jean Pierre Boyer, who assumed the presi- dency in 1818, was the first of the numerous rulers to unify the country and to maintain order throughout all its parts. For some years prior to his accession, two rival states strug- gled for supremacy, one of these heing a republic in the south and the other a monarchy in the north. In 1820, Boyer, who had succeeded to the chief magistracy of the republic, managed to unite the two states under one government; and two years later, when the former Spanish colony of Santo Domingo de- clared its independence 3 and was seeking annexation to the republic of Colombia, he marched an army into that part of the island and forced the leaders of the movement to accept union with Haiti. Thus, with the whole of the island under his con- trol, Boyer remained in office, under a provision of the consti- tution giving the president a life tenure, 4 until 1843, when he was forced to resign. The following year the eastern portion of the island withdrew and set up the independent republic of Santo Domingo. On the continent, the struggles of the Spanish colonies for in- dependence, and the subsequent essays of their people in the field of political organization, present a varied and interesting record. The vicissitudes of the republic of Colombia are fully of the revolution, on January 1st of the year indicated. Cf. Madion, His- toire d'Haiti, III, 115-118. s For the " Constitutive Act of the provisional government of the inde- pendent state of the Spanish part of Haiti," see British and Foreign State Papers, VIII, 557-570. * Boyer took office under the republican constitution of 1816. From 1801 to 1816 there had been adopted five different constitutions. The in- strument under which Boyer ruled remained in force as long as he con- tinued to exercise the chief magistracy. Cf. Janvier, Lea Constitutions d'Haiti, 1-154. Digitized by Microsoft® FORMATION OF NEW STATES 39 considered hereafter, in a chapter dealing with the ideals of Simon Bolivar; but it is proper here to remark that this new state, erected within the bounds of the old viceroyalty of New Granada and comprising what is to-day Venezuela, Colombia, and Ecuador, attained during the first years of its existence a position of the greatest promise. A republican constitution had been adopted in 1821, B and the executive, legislative, and judi- cial branches of the government had entered at once upon the exercise of their several functions. The Colombians them- selves believed that the foundation of a happy and prosperous nation had been laid; and foreign observers were equally con- vinced that the new republic, by virtue of the extent of its territory, the abundance of its natural resources, and the energy of its inhabitants, would soon take high rank among the na- tions of the world. 6 Moreover Colombia had acquired great prestige among the other new states by virtue of the contribu- » For an English translation of this constitution, see British and Foreign State Papers, XIX, 698-722. A French translation was published at Paris in 1822 under the title of Constitution de la RSpublique de Colombia. 6 In 1823 J. Q. Adams, then Secretary of State, in his instructions to Anderson, the first minister to Colombia, said: "The republic of Co- lombia, if permanently organized to embrace the whole territory which it now claims, and blessed with a government effectually protective of the rights of its people, is undoubtedly destined to become hereafter one of the mightiest nations of the earth. Its central position upon the surface of the globe, directly communicating at once with the Pacific and Atlantic oceans, north and south with the Caribbean Sea and the Gulf of Mexico, brings it into relations of proximity with every other part of the world: while the number and variety of its ports on every sea by which it is sur- rounded, the magnitude and extent of its navigable rivers, three of which, the Amazon, the Orinoco, and the Magdalena, are among the largest in the world, intersecting with numberless tributary streams, and in every di- rection, the continent of South America, and furnishing the means of water communication from every point of its circumference to every spot upon its surface; the fertility of its soil, the general healthiness and beauty of its climate, the profusion with which it breeds and bears the useful metals, present a combination of elements unparalleled in the location of the human race and relieve, at least from all charge of enthusiasm, the sentiment expressed by the late Mr. Torres (Colombian minister to the United States) that this republic appeared to have been destined by the Author of Nature ' as the center and the empire of the human family.' " American State Papers, Foreign Relations, V, 894. Digitized by Microsoft® 40 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS tion which it had made, in leadership and in men and material, to the final dissolution of Spanish dominion in the southern continent. The provinces of Eio de la Plata and the former captaincy- general of Chile, though as successful on the whole as Colombia in throwing off the Spanish yoke, were less fortunate in their early efforts at political organization. Buenos Aires, loosely confederated with a number of the provinces which had consti- tuted the vice-royalty of La Plata, maintained its independence in fact, after the first revolt in 1810, though the formal declara- tion was postponed until 1816 ; but conflicts between two oppos- ing systems of government, the unitary and the federal, long delayed the organization of a constitutional regime, and no doubt caused the loss of a large part of the territory which the leaders of Buenos Aires aspired to consolidate into a single na- tion. The province to the east of the river Uruguay, known as the Banda Oriental, having rebelled against the government of Buenos Aires, was occupied in 1817 by Brazil and held by that empire 7 for a decade until, as a result of a war between the two claimants, the disputed territory was recognized, by way of compromise, as the independent republic of Uruguay. Para- guay likewise declined to submit to Buenos Aires, and after successfully resisting a military expedition sent against it by the central authorities, its leaders set up an independent govern- ment which quickly fell into the hands of the dictator, Erancia, under whose rule it was to remain almost completely isolated from the world until his death in 1840. Efforts were also made to bring the territory known as Upper Peru, which formerly constituted a part of the vice-royalty of La Plata, under the authority of the government at Buenos Aires, but the forces 7 The revolt of the Banda Oriental against Buenos Aires was led by the famous Jose Artigas, who also opposed the occupation of the province by Brazil. Defeated by the Brazilians in 1820 Artigas was compelled to seek asylum in Paraguay, where he remained until his death in 1850. Digitized by Microsoft® FORMATION OF NEW STATES 41 sent to wrest it from the royalists were defeated. Its libera- tion was not effected until 1825, when the victorious patriot army under General Sucre marched into the country and organ- ized a provisional government which was shortly afterward superseded by the definitely constituted republic of Bolivia. Throughout the period of the wars of independence and for a generation afterward, the provinces which later united to form the Argentine Republic remained in a state of disorganization. A constitution framed by a constituent assembly composed of representatives of the several provinces was rejected in 1819, because, among other reasons, it failed to provide for local au- tonomy. During the next five years there was practically no national government, though the government of the province of Buenos Aires, which was then conducted in a wise and or- derly mannerj served, by virtue of treaty arrangements with the other provincial governments, as the representative of all in the conduct of foreign affairs. In December, 1824, a new con- stituent congress met at Buenos Aires, but the constitution for the " Argentine Nation," which, two years later, it adopted, was also rejected by the provinces. The state of anarchy which followed was taken advantage of by the dictator, Rosas, to im- pose his will upon the country, and it was not until his over- throw, in 1852, that any real progress was made toward the organization of a national government. 8 Chile, unlike the Argentine provinces, met with serious re- verses in the achievement of its independence. In 1814 the authority of Spain was reestablished throughout the colony and Chilean independence might have been long delayed but for the aid furnished by Argentine forces under San Martin. Born in 1778 at Yapeyu, a village in the viceroyalty of La Plata, near the frontier of Paraguay, San Martin received his education in Spain and served in the Spanish army against the French until 1811, attaining the rank of colonel ; but he aban- s Vedia, Constitucidn Argentina, 13-15; Arosemena, Estudios consti- tucionales sobre los gobiernos de la America Latima (2d ed.), I, 175, Digitized by Microsoft® 42 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS doned his promising military career in Spain to devote himself to the cause of the revolution in America. On his arrival in Buenos Aires he was entrusted with the organization of the national army. He later commanded the Patriot forces against the Royalists in Upper Peru, where, hecoming convinced that independence could not be assured so long as the Spaniards re- mained in possession of Lima, he conceived the plan of driving them from that stronghold by first liberating Chile and then advancing on Peru by way of the Pacific. 9 With this great project in mind, he obtained his appointment as governor of the province of Cuyo, situated on the eastern slope of the Andes at the gateway to Chile; and although the province was exceedingly poor, yet, with the help of Buenos Aires and the accession of Chileans who had fled across the Andes to escape Royalist persecution, he eventually succeeded in organizing and equipping an army which he considered ade- quate to his task. Accordingly, in January, 1817, San Martin led his band of Patriots across the Andes, and on February 12, with the cooperation of Chilean forces, won at Chacabuco a decisive victory over the Royalist forces. The viceroy of Peru, on learning of the Royalist defeat, sent a new expedi- tion against the Chileans; but on April 5, 1818, the Patriots, after having suffered several severe reverses, were again vic- torious in the decisive battle of Maipo. The independence of Chile being now firmly established, San Martin turned his atten- tion to the final step — the destruction of Spanish power in Peru ; but the execution of this design was complicated by po- litical events in Chile. After the battle of Chacabuco the Royalists abandoned San- tiago, the capital of the new Chilean republic, and a popular assembly, convened on the day the Chilean army entered the city, voted to place the supreme authority of the state in the 9 For a full account of the formation of San Martin's army and of his passage of the Andes, see Mitre, Historia de San Martin, I, 499-632. A good, brief account jn English is found in the Memoirs of General Miller, I, 90-108, ' *™ Digitized by Microsoft® FOKMATION OF NEW STATES 43 hands of San Martin. But the Patriot leader, believing that the acceptance of such a post would be prejudicial to the ac- complishment of his chief object, declined the honor, and on the following day the assembly named in his stead General Bernardo O'Higgins, who assumed office under the title of Su- preme Director. 10 O'Higgins, like San Martin and other leaders of the revolu- tion, had been educated in Europe. His mother was a native Chilean. His father, Ambrose O'Higgins, was an Irishman, who, having been sent as a child to Spain to be educated, pro- ceeded to seek his fortune, about the middle of the eighteenth century, in the Spanish colonies. After trading as an itinerant merchant from Costa Firme to Buenos Aires, he eventually settled in Chile and entered the royal service. Promoted in time to the captaincy-general of the province, he was afterward appointed by the king viceroy of Peru, a post which he contin- ued to hold until his death in 1801. The son Bernardo, born in 1778, was sent at the age of sixteen to Spain, but he soon passed over to England, where he remained in school till 1799. He then returned to Spain, and, in 1802, after some misadven- tures, embarked for Chile. In Europe he met Miranda, San Martin, and other Spanish American pioneers in the cause of colonial independence, and imbibed their views. He therefore returned to Chile with ideas inimical to the Spanish regime; and, from the beginning of the revolt until he became Supreme Director of Chile, he contributed increasingly important serv- ices to the cause of independence. 11 During the vigorous and effective administration of O'Hig- gins, the country enjoyed peace and prosperity. But his rule was autocratic. Believing that the deliberations of a national congress under the conditions then existing would result only io Barros Arana, Historia JeneraZ de Chile, X, 628-632 ; Mitre, His- toria de San Martin, II, 24. n Barros Arana, Historia Jeneral de Chile, XI, 663-680. Cf. also La- valle, Oaleria de retratos de los gobernadores y virreyes del Peril, and Mehegan, O'Higgina of Chile. Digitized by Microsoft® 44 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS in arousing civil dissension, he employed his influence and the power of his office to frustrate all attempts to assemble such a body. Likewise, in order to avoid the calling together of rep- resentatives of the people to sanction the declaration of inde- pendence, he hit upon the device of opening registers through- out the country in which the citizens could record their wishes on the subject. By the same unique method he secured the acceptance of a provisional constitution framed by a commis- sion which he appointed for the purpose. 12 This constitution, though intended to appease the demand for popular government, served to give the color of legality to the autocratic system already adopted. Attempts to disturb the established order, whether due to the personal ambition of military chiefs or to a more or less sincere desire to give the people a greater share in the management of their affairs, he firmly repressed, by means of the military forces at his command. 13 By the middle of the year 1820 widespread discontent had come to prevail and the demand for political reform had become more and more insistent. Realizing the necessity of making some concession to public clamor, the Supreme Director caused a convention to be assembled at Santiago in 1822 for the pur- pose of framing a new constitution. But the convention was so clearly a creature of the administration and the constitution which it hurriedly adopted so evidently failed to make effective the desired reforms, that the prevailing discontent was in no wise allayed. Toward the close of the year 1822, open rebel- lion broke out in the provinces of Coquimbo and Concepcion. In the latter province the movement was led by General Ramon Freire, whose distinction as a military leader was second only to that of O'Higgins. The troops sent to suppress the revolt abandoned the government and joined the rebels. In Santiago 12 See Proyecto de Constitucidn Provisoria para el Estado de Chile, pub- lished in 1818, to which was appended an exposition of the proposed method of ratification. is Barros Arana, Historia Jeneral de Chile., XI, 346, 520, 526. Digitized by Microsoft® FOKMATION OF NEW STATES 45 the feeling of dissatisfaction, though manifested in a less vio- lent manner, was no less acute, and in January, 1823, a pop- ular assembly met in that city to consider means for remedying the evils of which the country complained. Unwilling to strug- gle longer against such formidable opposition, O'Higgins relin- quished to a junta, named by the assembly, the authority with which he had been invested six years before. 14 This junta was composed of three influential citizens of the capital ; and it was hoped that, with public confidence restored, the new provisional authority would proceed to the definitive political and administrative organization of the republic. But the steps taken to that end did not meet with universal appro- bation. In the province of Concepcion the local assembly, backed by General Freire, declared that the provisional govern- ment should be composed of a representative of each of the three provinces into which the republic was then divided; namely, Concepcion, Santiago, and Coquimbo. Authorized to put this plan into execution, Freire transferred his army by sea to Val- paraiso, whence he marched upon Santiago. Encamping a few miles from the capital, he entered into negotiations with the junta, and soon reached an agreement by which the solution of the anomalous situations was entrusted, in accordance with his demands, to a so-called congress of plenipotentiaries, composed of a representative of each of the three provinces. 15 This " congress of plenipotentiaries " immediately set up a provisional government similar in every way to the autocratic system which had been the cause of O'Higgins's downfall, only three short months before. Freire was made Supreme Direc- tor. But the leaders in reality desired to organize the govern- ment on a democratic basis, and Freire convoked a constituent- assembly which met in August, 1823, and toward the close of the year adopted a constitution. Early in its proceedings, how- i* Barros Arana, Historia Jeneral de Chile, XIII, 695, 732, 817. After his abdication O'Higgins lived in retirement in Peru until his death in 1842. "Barros Arana, op. (At., XIII, 830; XIV, 18, 39. Digitized by Microsoft® 46 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS ever, the assembly gave constitutional sanction to the office of Supreme Director, and unanimously designated Freire to fill it for a period of three years. The constitution was promul- gated amid great rejoicing in January, 1824; but it was ill- adapted to the needs of the situation. Its framers, besides de- vising a complicated form of government, failed to take into account the established institutions and customs of the coun- try. In any circumstances the new system would have been difficult to administer; and, with a state of disorder pervading the country, the Supreme Director, after a few months of trial) became convinced of his inability to fulfill the duties of his office under the constitution and offered his resignation. It is hardly surprising that, instead of being permitted to resign, he was clothed anew with the dictatorial powers which had been found necessary to the maintenance of public order. Thus the constitution of 1823 became a dead letter. 16 Though the first attempts to establish popular government in Chile were failures, many of the leaders continued to cherish the hope that success would eventually crown their efforts. Among these was Freire himself. Returning to Santiago from the south, where he had brought to a happy termination, early in 1826, the final campaign against the few Spanish troops who still remained on Chilean soil, he convoked a constituent con- gress, to which he presented his resignation. Adopting a reso- lution to the effect that in future the official title of the chief executive should be that of president, the congress accepted Freire's resignation and elected Manuel Blanco Encalada in his stead. Thereafter the executive played a less important part in the affairs of the country. The congress also passed an act providing for the adoption of the federal system. In Jan- uary, 1827, it proceeded to consider the draft of a complete constitution. This project, it appears, was based on the Mexi- can constitution of 1824. Its discussion was attended with heated debates as to whether the system should be unitary or i« Barroa Arana, op. cit., XTV, 43, 125, 320, 391, 395, Digitized by Microsoft® FOKMATION OF KEW STATES 47 federal, and on this question the congress closed its sessions without reaching an agreement. In February, 1828, a new assembly took up the task which its predecessor had abandoned, and, thanks to its labors, the country was soon provided with a fundamental law which, when promulgated, was received throughout the republic, as had been the case in 1824, with manifestations of great satisfaction. 17 Although the constitution of 1828 was by far the best evi- dence which the Chileans had yet given of their capacity for political organization, yet it did not merit unqualified praise, nor did it in practice satisfy the general aspiration for a strong, vigorous government Agitation continued, and in 1833, the system which had been adopted — a compromise between the federal and the unitary system — was replaced by one from which every vestige of federalism was removed. With this accomplished the republic at last settled down to a condition of political stability. 18 Eeturning now to the expedition for the liberation of Peru, 19 it may be observed that O'Higgins, who was in complete accord with San Martin, lent to the latter his most cordial and ef- fective cooperation in the recruiting and equipping of the expe- ditionary force. The enterprise, however, was beset with enor- mous difficulties. To form, in a country of limited resources, and impoverished by years of conflict, an army sufficient to dis- « Barros Arana, op. tit., XV, 5, 32, 128, 144, 158, 269. !8 Barros Arana, op. cit., XVT, 62; for the constitution of 1833 and a brief account of the early attempts to organize politically the republic of Chile, see Arosemena, E studios constitucUmales sobre los gobiernos de la America Latina, I. 19 For a full history of the expedition see Historia de la Espedicion Li- bertadora del PerA (2 vols.), by the Chilean historian, Bulnes. Barros Ar- ana, Historia Jeneral de Chile, treats the subject fully. The best Argentine account is given by Mitre in his Historia de San Martin. For an account from the Peruvian standpoint, see Paz Soldan, Historia del Peru Independi- ente. The account given by one of the principal actors, Lord Cochrane, may be found in his Narrative of Services in the Liberation of Chile, Peru, and Brazil (2 vols.). Another foreigner (General William Miller), who took an active part in the expedition, has left an account in his Memoirs (2 vols.). Digitized by Microsoft® 48 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS lodge and disperse the Royalist forces entrenched in the Pe- ruvian capital and in occupation of advantageous positions in the interior of the country was an undertaking no less serious than that of obtaining transports for the troops and the im- provising of a naval force to convoy the expedition to its desti- nation and give it effective support. Nevertheless, in spite of these difficulties and of the inability of the government of Buenos Aires to provide the pecuniary assistance which it had promised, preparations went forward with commendable ra- pidity, so that toward the middle of 1820 the expedition was ready to strike the blow which, it was confidently believed, would put an end to Spanish power in America. The land forces, comprising about 4500 men, consisted of two divisions. One of these, composed chiefly of the remnants of the army which had accomplished the remarkable feat of cross- ing the Andes in 1817, was recruited with Chilean soldiers. The other, which was less numerous, contained Chileans only, though it was officered in part by men who had owed allegiance to Buenos Aires. Whether the majority of the men constitut- ing the two divisions were Argentine or Chilean is a point upon which historians of the two countries do not agree. 20 But, as a large proportion of the troops and the greater part of the officers were Argentine, the expedition affords an excellent ex- ample of the spirit of solidarity which prevailed among the people then struggling for freedom from Spanish rule. In December, 1818, the naval forces were put in charge of Lord Cochrane, who, although he had been dismissed from the British navy, enjoyed unimpaired the fame which he had previously acquired as a naval officer. Under his direction the incipient Chilean navy had already obtained the ascendancy over the Spanish squadron in the Pacific, and, when the expedition was ready to sail, adequate naval protection was afforded. In all seven warships, mounting 231 guns, were provided, their crews 20 Bulnes, Bistoria de la Espedioidti Libertadora del Peru I 207 • Mitre Historia de San Martin, II, 532. Digitized by Microsoft® FOEMATION OE NEW STATES 49 swelling the total number of men in the expedition to more than 6000. The expedition, which was placed under the general com- mand of San Martin, was, as originally planned, to be carried out under the joint authority of Chile and the United Provinces of Rio de la Plata, and a treaty to that end was concluded be- tween those governments. 21 By this treaty the contracting par- ties engaged to assist the inhabitants of Peru, in conformity with their expressed desires, in achieving independence, but were to leave them absolutely free to establish their own govern- ment, and, when the object of the expedition had been attained, were to withdraw the army from Peru, unless the three govern- ments should agree to retain it there for a longer period. The cost of the undertaking was to be jointly borne by the contract- ing parties, it being understood that as soon as an independent government had been established at Lima, that government should reimburse Chile and the United Provinces for the ex- penses incurred on account of the expedition. The government at Buenos Aires having failed to ratify the treaty, Chile as- sumed sole responsibility for the expedition; but, while no formal instructions were given to San Martin relative to the conduct which he should observe in Peru, it appears to have been generally understood that the spirit of the unratified treaty should nevertheless control the relations between the ex- peditionary forces and the state which it was proposed to bring into existence. 22 aiBulnes, Historia de la Espedicidn IAbertadora del Peru, I, 115. The treaty was signed at Buenos Aires on February 5, 1819, and ratified by Chile on March 15 following. Cf. Recopilacidn de tratados y convenciones celebrados entre la repubUca de Chile y las potencias extranjeras, I, 5. Also, Coleeci6n de tratados celebrados por la Bepiiblica Argentina con las naoiones extranjeras, I, 39. 22 Mitre, Historia de Ban Martin, II, 536, Dundonald (Lord Cochrane), Narrative of Services, I, 78. Instructions were prepared by the Chilean Senate but were never delivered by O'Higgins to San Martin. According to these instructions the objects of the expedition were: The emancipation of the inhabitants of Peru from the slavery and domination of the King of Spain; the establishment of a uniform system of civil and national liberty Digitized by Microsoft® 50 PAN-AMEEICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS While the rest of Spanish America had been swept into the movement for independence, the viceroyalty of Peru remained nominally loyal to the home government. The great mass of the population was composed of Indians of an exceedingly docile character. Accustomed under Inca rule to submission to a pa- ternal government, they had been easily conquered by a handful of Spanish adventurers, who superimposed upon the social and political organization of the Inca regime a system which left the population in the state of serfdom to which it had for cen- turies been subjected. Thus three hundred years of Spanish rule had done little to change the condition or the character of these people. An inert mass, without the spirit of independ- ence or the power of initiative, they were not easily moved to revolution; and although there existed in Peru a Creole class, such as furnished the directing force of the movement for inde- pendence, it found greater difficulty in pursuing its designs there than it did elsewhere in Spanish America; for, in addi- tion to the listlessness of the lower classes, it was obliged to reckon with the fact that the upper classes were generally op- posed to revolutionary movements. Not only did the large number of Spaniards employed in the government service, or engaged in commercial or other pursuits, constitute a conserv- ative element, but the nobility, at the top of the social scale, formed, by virtue of the number and distinction of its members, an important factor, the majority of whom used their influence to maintain the established order, in the fear that the titles which they so highly prized might otherwise be placed in jeopardy. In a society thus organized, the viceroy had been able, with the abundance of resources at his command, not only to suppress every outbreak occurring within the territory of throughout South America; the destruction of the servile partisans of Fer- dinand VII, who, quartered in that section, were carrying on an obstinate and destructive warfare; and the constitution of new, independent states, which, united with those already liberated, would present an impenetrable front to the power of Spain. The instructions are printed in Odriozola, Documentos Histdricoa del Peri, IV, 5-9. See, also, Bulnes, HistoHa de la Espediddn Libertadora del Peri, I, 214. Digitized by Microsoft® FORMATION OF NEW STATES 51 Peru, but even to send troops to reduce to submission otber sections in revolt. The Spanish power in Peru therefore con- stituted a menace, the destruction of which was one of the chief aims of the preparations which had been going on in Chile. 23 The expedition landed on the coast of Peru in September, 1820. It was well received by the Peruvians, many of whom joined the invading army ; and after some months San Martin, without risking a battle, succeeded, with the aid of the fleet, in compelling the forces of the viceroy to abandon the capital and retire into the mountains. Possession was then taken of the city, and on July 28, 1821, independence was formally de- clared, pursuant to an act signed by an assemblage of citizens previously convened by the Municipal Council of Lima for the purpose of giving expression to the popular will. 24 A few days later San Martin issued a decree establishing a provi- sional government, the supreme civil and military authority of which he himself exercised under the title of Protector. The only machinery of government for which the decree pro- vided was a cabinet of three members, whom it designated as follows: Juan Garcia del Rio, a Colombian, Minister of For- eign Relations ; Bernardo Monteagudo, an Argentine, Minister of War and Marine ; and Hipolito Unanue, a Peruvian, Minis- ter of Finance. By the terms of the decree this arrangement was to continue in force until the representatives of the Pe- ruvian nation should organize the government and take its ad- ministration into their own hands. 25 Prior to the evacuation of Lima, negotiations were begun be- tween San Martin and the Viceroy, Pezuela, looking to some form of accommodation. Pezuela proposed an arrangement by which the government of Chile and the expeditionary army should agree to submit to the authority of Ferdinand VII, un- 23 Bulnes, Historia de la Espedicidn Libertadora del Peril, I, 347, et seg.; Paz Soldftn, Eiatoria del Perti, Independiente, I, 27. 2 * Odriozola, Documentos Histdricos del Peri, IV, 262, 271. 25 Ibid., 318-320. See, also, Hall, Extracts from a Journal Written on the Coast of Chile, Peru, and Mewico, I, 266-270, Digitized by Microsoft® 52 PAN-AMERIOA^ISM: ITS BEGINNINGS der the Spanish constitution of 1812. This constitution had been cast aside by Eerdinand upon his return to the throne in 1814, but in March, 1820, it was restored in the Peninsula, and it had just been promulgated by the Royalist government at Lima. The exchanges came to nothing because of the Pa- triot leader's insistence upon the recognition of the independ- ence of Peru as a prerequisite to conciliation. Subsequently, however, through the interposition of an agent of the Spanish Government, Manuel Abreu, who had just arrived in Peru, negotiations were renewed. Conferences were begun in May and were not finally broken off until the evacuation of Lima by the Royalists, two months later. These negotiations, like the first, were fruitless; but they gave rise to a proposal which is of more than passing interest. In common with many of his contemporaries, San Martin believed that the form of govern- ment best adapted to the needs of the new states was the mon- archical. With a view therefore to its establishment in Peru, he proposed, in substance, that the independence of the coun- try be declared by the joint action of the two armies; that a provisional government be organized under a regency, the pres- ident of which should be La Serna, who had succeeded Pezuela as viceroy; and that commissioners be dispatched to Spain to ask the king to consent to the placing of a prince of his family upon the new throne. Though La Serna was at first inclined to regard with favor the solution thus proposed by San Martin, he afterward declined to accept it, thus putting an end to the project of founding an independent kingdom in Peru with the cooperation of the Royalist authorities. 26 But San Martin did not abandon the plan. Conditions in Peru appeared to him and to his political advisers to offer but little promise for the success of the republican form. On the other hand, for the monarchical form, the indispensable ele- 2« Paz Soldan, Historia del Peril Independiente, I, 69, 164-172; Bullies, Historia de la Espedicidn Libertadora del Peril, II, 93-129. The documents relating to these conferences are published in Odriozola, D'ooumentos His- fdricos del Peril,, IV, 139-238. Digitized by Microsoft® FORMATION OF NEW STATES 53 ment of aristocracy was already at hand, while the traditions of reverence and respect for everything pertaining to royalty had continued to be cherished among both the Creole and the native element of the population. The social organization and the example of the viceregal court had indeed made monarchical customs and practices much more familiar in Peru than else- where in Spanish America, with the possible exception of Mex- ico. Thus the establishment of a republic meant in Peru an especially violent break with the past, which, with the resulting disorders, San Martin desired to avoid. Accordingly, when he assumed the title of Protector, he took steps to revive the mon- archical project. Though personally a man of great modesty, he preserved in the new government all the pomp and cere- mony of the viceregal court; he validated the titles of the nobles of the old regime, created a new aristocratic order called the Order of the Sun, and appointed a council of state ; he also established a patriotic society whose real object, it soon became clear, was to carry on a propaganda in favor of the monarchical form of government. 27 Having thus adopted measures to counteract the further de- velopment of republican sentiment in Peru, San Martin ap- pointed two agents, Juan Garcia del Rio and Diego Paroissen, to proceed to Europe with a view to secure a monarch for the Peruvian throne. These envoys, who were to solicit enroute the cooperation of the governments of Chile and Buenos Aires, were instructed to go first to England, where they were to en- deavor to arrange with the government for the acceptance of the crown by the Prince of Saxe-Coburg, 28 or, if that were not practicable, by a prince of the reigning family, preferably the Duke of Sussex. In the event of failure in England, they were to negotiate in turn with Russia, Austria, France, Portu- gal, and lastly with Spain. Moreover, ministers plenipoten- " Bulnes, op. tit., 373 ff.; Paz Soldan, op. tit., I, 268. Villanueva, La Monarqula en America: BoUvar y el General San Martin, 190-194. 2 8 Leopold, afterward King of the Belgians. Digitized by Microsoft® 54 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS tiary were accredited by San Martin to the governments of the new Spanish American states, with instructions to use every possible means to induce them to follow the lead of Peru in the matter of political organization. 29 It is not desired to create the impression that San Martin's zeal for the monarchical form of government so far influenced his conduct as to lead him to disregard the moral obligation which he owed to the people of Peru, to allow them the fullest freedom in adopting for themselves whatever political system they might prefer. He believed not only that he was acting in harmony with the general sentiment, but also that the estab- lishment of a republic would result in anarchy and perhaps in the loss of independence. Being himself without ambition, he desired unselfishly to contribute to the permanent welfare of Peru and of the other new states formerly colonies of Spain, by giving them the only kind of government which, in his opin- ion, could maintain order and insure for them a free and pros- perous development. He did not intend to erect a throne at Lima in defiance of the will of the Peruvian people. 30 On the contrary, although he had little faith in popular assemblies, yet he convoked a congress to which he committed the respon- sibility of deciding upon the form of government and of fram- 2° Paz Soldan, Historia del Peri, Independiente, I, 270-278. so Captain Basil Hall of the British navy who was in Peru at this time had several interviews with San Martin and was impressed with his dis- interestedness. In his Extracts from a Journal Written on the Coasts of Chile, Peru, and Mexico, the following interesting passage occurs (I, 229) : " When all was quiet in the capital, I went to Callao, and hearing that San Martin was in the roads, waited on him on board his yacht. I found him possessed of correct information as to all that was passing, but he seemed in no hurry to enter the city, and appeared, above all things, anxious to avoid any appearance of acting the part of a conqueror. * For the last ten years,' said he, * I have been unremittingly employed against the Spaniards, or rather, in favor of this country, for I am not against any one who is not hostile to the cause of independence. All I wish is, that this country should be managed by itself, and by itself alone. As to the manner in which it is to be governed, that belongs not at all to me. I propose simply to give the people the means of declaring themselves independent, and of establish- ing a suitable form of government; after which I shall consider I have done enough and leave them.' " Digitized by Microsoft® FORMATION OE NEW STATES 55 ing a constitution in harmony with the system which might be adopted. But San Martin's plans were doomed to failure. Contrary to his expectation, there was an increasing trend of opinion toward republican institutions. Many of his administrative measures aroused bitter opposition. He was unpopular in the army. Conspiracies were hatched against him. Some of the ablest officers became disgusted and quit the service. Lord Cochrane openly defied his authority and sailed away with the warships under his command. The government of Buenos Aires was unfriendly. Misunderstandings arose with Chile over the pay of the expeditionary forces and with Colombia over the possession of Guayaquil. The severe defeat of a di- vision of the patriot army added to the difficulties of the situa- tion. As a consequence, the Royalists, who had never been dislodged from the greater part of Peru, took courage and be- gan to threaten the very existence of the new government. Desiring to placate public opinion and hoping to obtain ma- terial assistance in completing the emancipation of Peru, San Martin delegated early in 1822 to a Peruvian, the Marquis of Torre Tagle, the supreme authority which he as Protector had been exercising, and prepared to make a journey to Guayaquil to confer with Bolivar, who appeared to be in a situation which would permit him to furnish the desired help. San Martin expected Colombian aid not only on the ground of common interest but also on the ground of reciprocity, for troops from Peru were then fighting side by side with those of Colombia in freeing the province of Quito. Moreover, apart from the question of military support, he wished to come to an under- standing with Bolivar in regard to the form of government to be adopted by the new states, as well as to determine the ques- tion of the status of Guayaquil, which, as has been seen, was an object of contention between Colombia and Peru. The conference did not take place until July, 1822. 31 Mean- si San Martin gives a brief account of this celebrated conference in a Digitized by Microsoft® 56 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS while, Bolivar had completed the liberation of Quito, and by his aggressive action had assured the annexation of Guayaquil to Colombia. San Martin, by accepting the result, permitted this question to be eliminated. Upon the other questions, he found, after exchanging views with Bolivar, that it was impossible to reach a satisfactory agreement. The Liberator would neither furnish adequate assistance to San Martin, nor would he accept the tatter's invitation to take command of the combined forces of the two countries, in which the Argentine leader offered to serve in a secondary capacity. Bolivar's objections were that the Colombian laws did not permit the extension of his opera- tions beyond the limits of the republic, and that he was disin- clined, for reasons of delicacy, to have under his command so great a general as San Martin. As to the remaining question, the views of the two leaders were hopelessly divergent. San Martin, as we have seen above, had taken steps looking to the establishment of a monarchy in Peru with a prince of some European house as sovereign ; and to assure success he wished to have thrones erected in the other new states. Bolivar on the other hand was a partisan of republicanism and San Martin was unable to shake his attachment to that system. This diver- gence, was, doubtless, a still more effective reason for the Libera- tor's present unwillingness to place the Colombian army at the disposal of Peru. Thus, San Martin failed to attain any of the objects for which he had made the journey to Guayaquil. Disheartened, he re- turned to Lima in August, 1822, only to find the city in a state of growing discontent. During his absence Monteagudo, letter to General William Miller, dated Brussels, April 19, 1827. Cf. San Martin, Su Correspondencia (3d ed.), 70-74. For other accounts see Lar- razabal, Vida del Libertador; Paz Soldan, Historia del Peru Independiente, I, 308-312; Mitre, Historia de San Martin, III, 602-635; Villanueva, Bo- livar y el General Bern Martin, 235-251. See also Destruje, La entrevista de Bolivar y San Martin en Guayaquil; La Cruz, La entrevista de Guaya- quil; Goenaga, La entrevista de Guayaquil. This latter work, containing the report of the interview by Bolivar's secretary general, which until 1910 remained unpublished, throws new light on the subject. Digitized by Microsoft® FORMATION OF NEW STATES 57 his chief political adviser, who had exercised a controlling in- fluence in the administration of the government, had, by reason of certain harsh and oppressive measures, become so obnoxious that the people finally took matters into their own hands, com- pelling him to resign and go into banishment. This incident still further discouraged San Martin and strengthened his re- solve to quit the country ; and when, a month after his return to Lima, the congress assembled, he resigned all authority into the hands of the representatives of the people and immediately embarked for Chile. Passing thence to his estate in the prov- ince of Cuyo, he tarried there until the beginning of 1824, when, in order to avoid being drawn into the civil strife with which the provinces of the Rio de la Plata were continually afflicted, he took passage for Europe, where he spent the re- mainder of his days in obscurity. 32 The people of Peru being at last left free to establish their own form of government, the congress, in the reaction against the centralization of power which existed under the protector- ship of San Martin, appointed three of its own members as a commission to exercise the executive authority under the title of junta gubernativa, until a constitution should be adopted and a government organized in accordance with its provisions. 33 Kb autocrat, no foreign prince, would be tolerated. The pow- ers and instructions given to San Martin's agents in Europe, in so far as they related to the establishment of a monarchy in Peru, were declared to be without effect. In December, 1822, a provisional constitution, providing for a popular, representa- tive government with the customary division of powers, was adopted. Eleven months later a definitive constitution, based on these principles, was formally promulgated, but, for reasons which will now appear, it never became effective. The junta gubernativa having proved to be an unsatisfactory 32 Bullies, Espedioidn Libertadora del Perti, II, 484. San Martin died at Boulogne, France, in 1850. 33 Paz Soldan, Eistoria del PerA Independiente, II, 6. Digitized by Microsoft® 58 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS executive body, the severe defeat of an expedition which it had sent against the Royalists was made use of to precipitate a change. In compliance with a petition of the officers of the army and in response to a general public demand, the congress abolished the junta and created the office of president, to which it appointed Jose de la Riva Agiiero, a Peruvian patriot who had long been active in the cause of independence. As the na- tion's executive and as co mm ander in chief of its armed forces, Eiva Agiiero displayed great activity, and within a few brief months greatly improved the situation. He augmented the army and sent a formidable expedition against the Royalists in the south ; he organized reserves and strengthened the navy ; he obtained an auxiliary force from Colombia, and in general put the country in a better posture for offensive and defensive operations. But in spite of these measures more serious re- verses were in store. In June, 1823, upon learning that Lima had been weakened by the withdrawal of troops for the expedi- tion to the south, the able Royalist leader, Canterac, marched upon the capital and took it without a struggle, the Patriot forces having in the meantime retired to the fortress of Callao. In consequence the congress was dispersed, some of the mem- bers remaining in Lima, others fleeing the country or escaping to neighboring provinces, and still others following the army to Callao. This latter group, though constituting a minority, continued to meet as the congress of Peru. Riva Agiiero was blamed for the loss of the capital and had to suffer accordingly. Not only did the congress deprive him of the chief military command, but, as a further mark of dis- approval, resolved to transfer, contrary to his expressed wish, the seat of government to the town of Trujillo, some three hun- dred miles to the north of Lima. The command of the army was intrusted to General Sucre, 84 commander of the Colombian 34 Antonio Jose de Sucre was born in Cumana, Venezuela, in 1795. En- rolling in the patriot army in 1812, he rapidly rose to high rank and before the close of the wars of independence had become Bolivar's most Digitized by Microsoft® FORMATION OF NEW STATES 59 auxiliary force and Bolivar's diplomatic representative, who, by a later decree of the congress, was also authorized to exer- cise full power, civil as well as military, in the area in which the war was actively prosecuted. But, when Sucre took the field, he delegated the civil authority to Torre Tagle. Thus two governments were set up — one at Trujillo under Riva Agiiero, and the other at Callao, and later at Lima, under Torre Tagle. 35 The confusion into which the country had fallen caused the Peruvian patriots to forget local pride and petty jealousies and to look abroad for a leader skillful enough to unite the conflict- ing factions and strong enough to save the nation from the certain consequence of anarchy — resubjugation to the Spanish crown. This was the opportunity for which Bolivar had been waiting. Although the Peruvians had already entered into correspondence with him, they had been unwilling to grant him the authority which he required. But, with San Martin out of the way, there was no longer a leader whose achievements were comparable with his own. The Peruvians had made an essay at self-government and had failed. The moment was auspicious. Accordingly, when a commission arrived from Peru to renew the invitation, Bolivar accepted without further cavil, and, duly authorized by the congress of Colombia, set out to win new glory in the emancipation of Peru. He reached Lima on September 1, the Royalists having again evacuated the city. The next day he was granted au- trusted lieutenant. He was personally in command of the united Patriot forces at Ayacueho — Bolivar being absent at the time the battle was fought — and on account of that great victory he was made Grand Marshal of Ayacueho. After driving the Royalists from upper Peru he aided in the establishment of the republic of Bolivia and became its first president. He returned to Colombia in 1828 and met death two years later at the hands of an assassin. Second to none of his contemporaries as a military leader, he was no less eminent as a diplomatist and as a political adminis- trator. See for his letters, O'Leary, Memorias, I. See also, Irisarri, His- toria Crttica del Asesinato cometido en la persona del Oram, Mariscal de Ayacueho. 35 Paz Soldan, Eistoria del Peril Independiente, II, 83, 99. Digitized by Microsoft® 60 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS thority to settle the anomalous situation which had arisen out of the establishment of the two governments under Torre Tagle and Riva Agiiero. On September 10 he was invested by the congress with full military and political authority under the title of Liberator, Torre Tagle being permitted to retain only minor functions; and when, in November, Riva Agiiero was arrested on a charge of treasonable correspondence with the enemy and banished from the country, the Liberator remained in undisputed control of the whole of the emancipated terri- tory. It was during this period that the constitution of 1823 was adopted and promulgated. But in order that the Liberator might not be embarrassed by restrictions, the congress passed a resolution on February 10, 1824, amplifying his dictatorial powers and authorizing him in particular to suspend those articles of the constitution which " might be incompatible with the salvation of the republic." The congress then adjourned subject to the dictator's call. 36 The outcome of the war has already been indicated. After its conclusion, Bolivar gave his attention exclusively to the realization of certain political plans which had long been re- volving in his mind. As this subject receives full considera- tion in a subsequent chapter, a brief reference to it at this point will suffice. Shortly after the victory of Ayacucho, which assured the independence of Peru and relieved the other new states of the fear of resubj ligation, Bolivar assembled the Pe- ruvian congress 3T and resigned into its hands the dictatorial authority with which it had invested him. His resignation was not accepted. On the contrary, his dictatorial powers were extended until the congress should meet in 1826, and, as pro- vided in the constitution of 1823, take steps to organize the government on a legal basis. But, when, in September, 1826, 36 The decrees referred to are found in Anales Pwrlamentarios del Peri, I, 497, 499. 37 The congress here referred to was the first congress convoked by San Martin in 1821. After being in session for a short time it was dissolved (March 10, 1825). Digitized by Microsoft® FOBMATION OF NEW STATES 61 events in Colombia compelled him to return to that country, he had not been divested of his authority, a new congress hav- ing assembled and adjourned without taking action. Before embarking for Colombia, therefore, Bolivar delegated his pow- ers to General Santa Cruz, in the hope that, by retaining a hold on Peru, the plan which was then uppermost in his mind — the federation of Colombia, Peru, and Bolivia — might be more readily advanced. Once freed, however, from the domi- nating influence of Bolivar's personality, the national spirit of Peru asserted itself. Early in 1827 the authority which the Liberator still attempted to exercise through Santa Cruz was thrown aside and a provisional government under the constitution of 1823 was organized. A convention was then called to revise the constitution. The result was a new instru- ment which was promulgated in 1828, from which date con- stitutional government in Peru definitely takes its beginning. 38 Mexico and Central America formed a group apart. Dur- ing the three centuries of Spanish domination, intercourse be- tween the colonies to the south of the Isthmus and those to the north of it was infrequent. Mexico and Guatemala were for- bidden to trade by way of the Pacific with Peru and New Granada; and, although all commercial restrictions were re- laxed during the last quarter of the eighteenth century, suffi- cient time had not elapsed to permit the development of inti- mate relations between the two sections. On the other hand, the fleet system, which involved the distribution of all goods for the southern colonies through Porto Bello and Cartagena, led to a constant movement back and forth from the shores of the Caribbean overland to Quito and from Porto Bello across the Isthmus to Panama, thence by water to Lima, and then on by land to the closed port of Buenos Aires. 39 The habits of generations, therefore, had prepared the colonies of the 3s Vargas, Historic/, del Peril Independiente, III, 243 ; Aroaemena, Consti- tuciones PoUticas (2d ed.), II, 424. as Bourne, Spain in America, 291; Alaman, Historia de Mexico, I, 112, Digitized by Microsoft® 62 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS southern continent for cooperation ; whereas between the south- ern and the northern groups the situation was just the reverse. Besides, as communication by land between Mexico and South America was not feasible, contact between the two sections, during the wars of independence, was rendered extremely diffi- cult; for Spain controlled the seas. Beginning in 1810, the revolution in Mexico continued for a decade without positive results. During its first stage, under the leadership of the priest, Miguel Hidalgo, there appears to have been no well-defined plan of political organization, though the object of the movement was declared by Hidalgo himself to be that of wresting the control of the government from the " Europeans " ; that is, the Spaniards, who had fallen under the domination of the Erench. 40 During the second stage of the revolution, from 1811 to 1815, under the leadership of an- other priest, Jose Maria Morelos, the situation became, from the political standpoint, somewhat more clearly defined, yet it must be remarked that harmony of purpose and of action was by no means attained. When in 1811 Hidalgo was taken pris- oner and executed, one of his ministers and his ablest sup- porter, Ignacio Lopez Rayon, took the initiative in organizing a revolutionary government. Following the example which had been set in Spain and in different parts of America, Rayon formed a junta to govern in the name of Eerdinand VII. In the limited territory controlled by the Patriots, however, obedi- ence was never generally accorded to this junta. Morelos him- self, though maintaining friendly relations with it, never recog- nized its authority. To him a government in the name of the Spanish king was utterly repugnant. Desiring to establish a government whose authority would be respected by all who were attached to the Patriot cause, Morelos convoked a congress, which assembled at Chilpancingo in September, 1813. This congress, after electing Morelos as 40Alamftn, Historia de Mixico, X, 361, 376; Zavala, Ensayo Hist&rioo de las Eevoluciones de Mexico, I, 65. Digitized by Microsoft® FOKMATION OF NEW STATES 63 commander in chief, proclaimed on November 6 the independ- ence of Mexico. During the next year, though compelled to migrate frequently from place to place in order to escape cap- ture, it framed a provisional constitution which was promul- gated on October 24, 1814. 41 This instrument was an adapta- tion of the Spanish constitution of 1812 to the republican form of government. But its operation, even within the narrow limits of the territory controlled by the revolutionists, was only nominal, and its duration was brief, for the congress was soon dispersed and Morelos, the main support of the new regime, was, like his predecessor, Hidalgo, captured and executed. 42 For the next four or five years the revolution was prosecuted in a desultory fashion, without organization and without ef- fectiveness, until it entered upon its final stage under circum- stances which will now be briefly related. By the year 1820 the fires of the revolution appear to have been almost extinguished. With the exception of a band under General Vicente Guerrero, now driven to seek refuge in the mountains of the south, no considerable force remained on foot to oppose the disciplined troops at the command of the Viceroy. In reality, as the result of a lack of leadership, of organization, and of unity of purpose, the revolutionary wars had been characterized by such ineffectiveness and by such excesses that the Mexican nobility, the higher clergy, the great landed proprietors, and in general the more enlightened classes had been rather confirmed in their attachment to the Koyalist cause than attracted to that of independence. And yet the upper classes of Mexican society were not hostile to the idea of independence itself. On the contrary, they generally fa- vored separation from the mother country, provided it could be effected without jeopardizing their special interests. That is to say, if the character of the revolution were changed from 41 For the declaration of independence and the constitution of 1814, see Gamboa, Leyes Constitucionales de Mixioo durante el Biglo, XIX, 235, 237 ff. « Alaman, Historia de Mfaieo, III, 545 ; IV, 166, 313, 334. Digitized by Microsoft® 64 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS a popular to an aristocratic movement, their opposition to it would largely disappear. An event which occurred in Spain early in 1820 furnished the occasion for just such a change and led to the rapid consummation of independence under condi- tions more or less satisfactory to all elements of the popula- tion. The event referred to was the reestablishment of the Spanish constitution. The restoration of Eerdinand VII in 1814 and his putting aside of the constitution of 1812 had caused great rejoicings among the Loyalists in Mexico, and now that a lib- eral system was again to prevail, they, and especially the clergy, became greatly concerned as to the security of their special in- terests. The first impulse was to prevent the promulgation of the constitution and to offer Ferdinand an asylum in Mexico, where absolute government might be maintained unimpaired. But wiser counsels prevailed. The constitution was proclaimed and the new order of things was nominally accepted. Mean- while, plans were laid to unite all parties on a program whose end was independence. 43 Colonel Augustin Iturbide, a Mexican who had won distinc- tion in the royalist army against the insurgents and who up to this moment had remained loyal to the king, was chosen to carry the plans into effect. It was essential to win the support of those who had for a decade been fighting for independence, or if any should oppose, to break their power of resistance. Guerrero with his followers in the south appeared to present the most serious obstacle, and Iturbide determined to deal with him as the first step in the accomplishment of his enterprise. Obtaining from the viceroy, who was not a party to the con- spiracy, a commission to put down the remnant of the insurgent forces, Iturbide marched against Guerrero late in the year 1820. After a few skirmishes in which the rebels were suc- cessful, Iturbide became convinced that the insurrection could 43 AlamAn, Historia de Mexico, V, 14, 60 ; Zavala, Ensayo Histdrico de las Revoluciones de Mexico, I, 108; Poinsett, Notes on Mexico 264, Digitized by Microsoft® FOKMATION OF NEW STATES 65 not be terminated by force as readily as he bad hoped. He therefore resolved to try a different procedure. 44 Entering into communication with the rebel leader, Iturbide obtained without great difficulty the promise of his adhesion to the revolution in its new form. In the meantime agents had been sent to win over the leaders in different parts of the coun- try. Progress was rapid, and Iturbide was soon ready to make an open avowal of his intentions. Accordingly, on February 24, 1821, he issued a proclamation which, while explaining the causes that impelled the separation of Mexico from the mother country, set forth the principles on which it was proposed to found the new order. This declaration of principles, being associated in name with the place at which it was published, is known to history as the Plan of Iguala. 45 Its essential pro- visions were: First, the conservation of the Catholic religion without tolerance of any other; secondly, absolute independ- ence under a constitutional monarchy to be known as the Mex- ican Empire ; and thirdly, the intimate union of Americans and Europeans; that is, citizenship and equality of rights for all, regardless of place of birth. Thus, under the device, religion, independence, union, the Mexican revolution entered upon its final stage. The Plan of Iguala provided that the crown be offered to Ferdinand VII, and in the event of his failure to accept it, to the other members of his family in succession. It further provided that the country should be ruled in the interregnum by a body of regents, the presidency of which was offered to the Viceroy, Apodaca, in the expectation that he would not be unwilling to give his support to the scheme as it was set forth in Iturbide's proclamation. But Apodaca, far from giv- ing the movement his support, prepared to resist it by every means in his power. He did not proceed, however, with the ** Alaman, Historia de Mixico, V, 57, 84. *« The Plan of Iguala is printed in full in the Appendix to Vol. V of Alamfln's Historia de Mexico, and in Gamboa's Leyes y Gonstituciones de Mexico, 283. Digitized by Microsoft® 66 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS vigor which, in the opinion of the officers of the Koyalist army, the occasion demanded, and they deposed him, appointing one of their own number, Francisco Novella, in his stead. This step did not result, as it was hoped it would, in arresting the progress of the revolution. On the contrary, the revolutionary ranks continued to fill with recruits from all sides and the country gradually passed into the control of the Patriots. Early in August, 1821, Iturbide entered the city of Puebla, which for some time had been invested, and from this advan- tageous position he disposed his troops to begin the siege of the capital itself. 46 Shortly before the fall of Puebla a new viceroy, Juan O'Donojii by name, arrived at Vera Cruz. Being a liberal in politics, O'Donojii was little inclined to employ force to reduce the Mexicans to submission; and, when he perceived that all the important interests in the country had at last been drawn into the movement for independence, he readily concluded that the continuance of the struggle was futile. He therefore en- tered into negotiations with Iturbide, and on August 24 con- cluded with him, though without authority, an agreement con- firmatory of the Plan of Iguala. This agreement, known as the Treaty of Cordova 4T because of its having been signed at a little town by that name some hundred miles inland from Vera Cruz, departed in one important particular from the Plan of Iguala; that is, it authorized the Mexican Cortes' to elect an emperor in the event that none of the Spanish Bour- bons should accept the crown. By this change the way to the throne was opened to the ambition of Iturbide. Because of O'Donojii's lack of authority to conclude such an agreement, Novella and the leaders of the Royalist army declined to abide by it. Nevertheless Iturbide was able to take possession of the city of Mexico and to set up a government « AlamSn, op. cit., V, 257 ff. « A translation of the treaty is found in American State Papers, Foreign Relations, IV; see also, Alaman, Hisioria de Mexico, V, Appendix- and Gamboa, op. cit., 286. Digitized by Microsoft® FORMATION OF NEW STATES 67 without serious interference from the Royalists. The Regency, under the Plan of Iguala, was organized with Iturbide as its president, to which office was attached the chief command of the armed forces on land and sea. O'Donojii, who had en- tered the capital with the Patriot troops, was made one of the regents ; but he died suddenly a few days later. In February, 1822, a national congress, convoked by the regency, met in the City of Mexico. In this assembly opposition to the regency was at once manifested by the former followers of Hidalgo and Morelos — the " old patriots " — because of the evident inten- tion of Iturbide to usurp the throne. Of the five members of the regency, three, who were strong partisans of Iturbide, were deposed and were replaced with persons hostile to him. More- over an active propaganda was begun in the press in favor of the establishment of a republic, and conspiracies were formed with that end in view. In due time news arrived of the rejection of the treaty of Cordova by the Spanish Government. Iturbide then deter- mined to gain possession of the throne without further delay. The situation was serious and uncertain, and the method of his procedure was altogether irregular. On the night of May 18, 1822, disorganized bands of soldiers and crowds of the lowest class of people, known in Mexico as leperos, acclaimed him as emperor; and on the following day a mob composed of like elements of the population invaded the halls of the Na- tional Assembly and by threats of violence compelled that body to give its approval to the choice of the populace. If the cir- cumstance of intimidation had not deprived the action of the congress of its legal force, the further circumstance that less than a majority of the deputies were present and that a re- spectable number of these voted in the negative, would have sufficed to cast grave doubt upon the validity of the emperor's title. 48 48 Mexican historians are in substantial agreement as to the facts relat- ing to the establishment of the empire. Cf. Alamftn, Historia de Miasico, Digitized by Microsoft® 68 PAN-AMEKICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS Although the conditions under which Iturbide assumed the crown were not such as to inspire confidence, yet, if he had possessed political sagacity, had had the good judgment to conciliate the partisans of representative go\ernment, and had not committed all manner of political blunders, he might have been able to induce the leaders of the various groups to give the new regime their united support. But, lacking penetra- tion and balance, he pursued a contrary course. In the first place, he made his government ridiculous in the eyes of many of his subjects by forming an imperial court whose members were premitted to enact the farce of imitating manners and customs to which the precedents of generations alone gave sanc- tion in the monarchies of the Old World. In the second place, he aroused bitter opposition on the part of those who were hostile to arbitrary government by gradually usurping the pow- ers of the congress and finally by dissolving it altogether. 49 The inevitable result was the downfall of the empire. In De- cember, 1822, Colonel Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna, destined to occupy the center of the stage in Mexican affairs for long years to come, raised the standard of revolt at Vera Cruz. Declaring in favor of the republican form of government, he - was soon joined by Victoria, Guerrero, and other veterans of the early struggles for independence. The uprising spread rap- idly and soon became so formidable that the emperor attempted to check it by reassembling the congress which he had boldly dissolved a few months before. But his efforts were of no avail. Realizing at length that his situation was hopeless, he sent to the congress on March 19, exactly ten months after his elevation to the throne, a formal renunciation of the imperial crown. This renunciation the congress, in order to avoid even V, 591 ff.; Zavala, Ensayo Histdrico, I, 164 ff.; Bustamente, Cuadro His- tdrico, VI, 91 ff. Both Zavala and Bustamente were members of the con- gress. A good, brief account is given by J. R. Poinsett in his Notes on Mexico, 265-274. 49Alamfln, Historia de Mexico, V, 637, 662; Zavala, Ensayo Histdrico, I, 175. Digitized by Microsoft® FORMATION OF NEW STATES 69 an implied recognition of his right to the thing renounced, re- fused to accept ; hut it voted to permit him to quit the country and to pay him an annual stipend of 25,000 pesos, on condition that he establish his residence in Italy. 50 To this condition Iturbide agreed. His subsequent career was as brief as it was tragic. Placed aboard a British vessel chartered for the purpose, he was con- ducted to Italy; but he remained there only a short time. Making his way to England, where he arrived in January, 1824, he informed the Mexican Government of his movements, attributing his breach of agreement to the desire to aid in re- pelling an attack, which, he declared, Spain was preparing, in conjunction with the Holy Alliance, upon the independence of Mexico. The Mexican congress, however, fearing that it was his purpose to regain the imperial throne, decreed that he should be dealt with as a traitor and an outlaw, if, upon any pretext whatever, he should set foot upon Mexican soil. Ignorant of this measure, Iturbide, some four months after his arrival in England, embarked for Mexico. About the middle of July his ship cast anchor on the coast near Soto la Marina, where, ac- companied by Colonel Beneski, a Polish officer who had for- merly been in the imperial service in Mexico, he went ashore. But in spite of his disguise he was recognized and placed under arrest. The commandant of the district, Felipe la Garza, be- ing in doubt as >to whether he should at once give effect to the proscription, resolved to consult the provincial congress of Tamaulipas, which was in session at the neighboring town of Padilla. No sooner was the matter presented to that body than Garza was ordered immediately to proceed with the execu- tion of the law, and in the afternoon of the same day, July 19, Iturbide was shot in the public square. 51 50 Bustamente, Bistoria del Emperador D. Agustin de Iturbide, 135. si The best account of the capture and execution of Iturbide is that given by Garza in his official report, which is found in full in Bustamente's Historia del Emperador, 249-258. Iturbide's Memoirs were published in England by M. J. Quin, on the eve of the former Emperor's return to Mexico. Digitized by Microsoft® 70 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS Meanwhile, progress had been made toward the establish- ment of popular government in Mexico. Upon the abdication of Iturbide the congress vested the executive authority of the nation in a junta of three members, each of whom was author- ized to serve for alternate periods of one month in the office of president. In response to a general demand a new congress was convoked to meet the following October for the purpose of framing a constitution. Political parties at once began to form on the issue of a unitary system with little local autonomy, as opposed to a federal system with a weak central authority. Monarchism practically disappeared. The Bourbonists — that is, those who had favored the establishment of a Bourbon em- pire in Mexico, and who had never become reconciled to the elevation of Iturbide to the throne — gave their support to the group which stood for a strong centralized government; while the Iturbidists, moved in part, no doubt, by resentment against the Bourbonists, whom they blamed for the emperor's down- fall, joined forces with the partisans of a federal system. The centralists drew into their ranks a majority of the Spaniards resident in the country, the higher clergy, and the men of wealth and standing in the community; while the federalists, composed in the main of the humble sort of folk, gained strength and prestige by the adhesion of the " old patriots " — now regarded as the real national heroes — to their cause. Thus the two parties came to be distinguished not only as cen- tralistic and federalistic, but as aristocratic and democratic, re- spectively. 52 The same year the volume was translated and published In French under the following title: Memoires Autographes de don Agustin Iturbide, ex- empereur du Mexique, nontenant le detail des principaux evenements de sa vie politique, avee une preface et des pieces justificatwes. A pamphlet by Beneski, entitled: A Narrative of the Last Moments of the Life of Don Agustin de Iturbide, ex-emperor of Mexico, was published in New York in 1825. The following recent studies of Iturbide have appeared: La Ouerra de Independencia, Hidalgo — Iturbide (1910), by Francisco Bulnes, and Don Agustin de Iturbide by Augustin de Iturbide in the Records of the American Catholic Historical Society for December, 1915 and March 1916. 62 Alamfin, Historia de Mexico, V, 763; Zavala, Ensay'o Histdrico, I, 254. Digitized by Microsoft® FORMATION OF NEW STATES 71 When the new congress assembled it was seen that the feder- alists were in the majority; in fact, they all appeared to have been federalists, differing only in the degree of local autonomy which they severally favored. A Constituent Act setting forth the fundamental principles upon which it was proposed to found the government was the first matter to receive consid- eration. The adoption of Articles 5 and 6 of the Act, provid- ing that the form of government should be that of a federal republic composed of states " free and sovereign " in all mat- ters pertaining to their internal administration, was the point upon which discussion principally turned. One of the repre- sentatives, Father Mier, a man of learning, whose long resi- dence and varied experiences in Europe and in the United States added authority to his words, made a notable address in which he pointed out the dangers attendant upon too great decentralization in the government. The prosperity of the United States under a loosely federated system had served, he thought, to blind the Spanish American countries to important differences between the two sections. He called attention to the fact that the Thirteen Colonies were originally separate and independent states and that they had formed a federation for the purpose of opposing their united strength to the oppression of England. For Mexico, already united, to break up into a loose federation would be but to weaken itself by division and to give free rein to the very evils which it was desired to hold in check. The want of enlightenment among the masses, the political inexperience of those who would be called upon to administer the local governments, the necessity for vigorous action to maintain order and preserve independence, and finally the very geographical configuration of the country, demanded that power should be retained for the most part in the hands of the central authorities. The speaker did not, however, con- demn the principle of federation itself. He merely opposed the application of it in such a way as to weaken the effective- ness of the national government. His ideal was a system mid- Digitized by Microsoft® 72 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS way between that of the United States, where an excess of local autonomy prevailed, and that of Colombia and Peru, where centralization of authority was carried to an extreme. 53 But argument was in vain. The Act was passed and, being promulgated in January, 1824, served as a fundamental law until the following October, when the constitution was com- pleted and put into effect. 54 In respect to the general provi- sions which this instrument made for the organization of the executive, legislative, and judicial powers of the government, as well as in respect to the large measure of local control which it permitted to the provinces — henceforth to be called states — it followed the Constitution of the United States more or less closely. It is not to be inferred, however, that the Mexi- can constitution was a servile imitation of that of the United States; for 'throughout, in form as well as in spirit, it shows unmistakable evidences of having been strongly influenced by the Spanish constitution of 1812. 55 In accordance with the provisions of the new fundamental law, a president was elected — the choice falling to General Victoria who had already been elected provisionally — and the United Mexican states appeared at last to have attained definite political organization. Four years later, however, Victoria's term of office came to a close amid circumstances of the greatest disorder. The constitution from which so much had been expected was violated. The presidential succession was determined by force and a period of anarchy from which Mexico was long to suffer was begun. 58 Amid the upheavals which for years had been stirring the other Spanish American countries, the captaincy-general of ss The speech is published in : Gonzalez, Biografia del Benemerito Mexi- cano D. Servanda Teresa de Mier Noriega y Chierra, 350-363 ; and in Busta- mente, Historia del Emperador Agustln de IturMde, 200-216. s* For the constitution see Gamboa, Leyes y Constituciones de Mfxico, 313-357. 55 Cf. an article by James Q. Dealey on The Spanish Source of the Mex- ican Constitution of 1824, in the Quarterly of the Texas State Historical Association for January, 1900. oe Alaman, Historia de M6xico, V, 812-843. Digitized by Microsoft® FORMATION OF NEW STATES 73 Guatemala, embracing the provinces of Guatemala, Chiapas, Honduras, San Salvador, Leon (Nicaragua), and Costa Rica, had remained in a state of relative tranquillity. There had been revolts, it is true, but being sporadic they had been easily suppressed. Not until 1820, when the Spanish constitution was restored and freedom of speech was extended to the colonies, did a general movement in favor of independence make itself felt throughout Central America. The proclamation of the Plan of Iguala, to which Chiapas adhered, had the effect of hasten- ing decisive action on the part of the other provinces. Guate- mala, the capital, declared its independence on September 15, 1821; but, as the captain-general, Gainza, and the other co- lonial authorities joined in the declaration, they were con- tinued in office under a consultative junta, which was author- ized to exercise a general supervision over their acts. A con- gress was called, to which the other provinces were invited to send delegates, to decide whether or not independence should be made general and absolute, and if so, to determine the form of government and to frame a constitution. The way was thus purposely left open for a possible agreement, which Gainza and many others favored, for incorporation in the Mexican Empire under the Plan of Iguala. This idea, however, was not gener- ally approved, and, when Gainza took the oath of allegiance under the new order, he was required to employ a formula de- claring specifically that Guatemala was independent of Mexico and of all other nations. 57 Guatemala's declaration had the effect of precipitating action on the part of the other provinces. All declared their inde- pendence of Spain, but not all entertained the same opinion as to their future status. San Salvador was inclined to main- tain an independent position without connection with either Guatemala or Mexico. Nicaragua was divided, a part of the province being in favor of incorporation in the empire of "Marure, Bosquejo' Histdrico de las Revoluciones de Oentro America, I, 25. Alam&n, Historia de Mexico, V, 344. Digitized by Microsoft® U PAN-AMEKICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS Mexico and a part preferring union with Guatemala. Hon- duras was similarly divided, while Costa Kica declared its in- dependence of all powers and resolved to await the outcome of events to decide upon its future connections. 58 When the news reached Mexico that the province of Chiapas had expressed a desire to become incorporated in the Mexican empire under the Plan of Iguala, the regency, but recently created, proclaimed its incorporation and ordered that in the convocation of the Cortes an invitation to send deputies to that body should be extended not only to Chiapas but to any other province or part of a province manifesting a desire to unite with Mexico. 59 Soon afterward, when Guatemala's action be- came known at the Mexican capital, Iturbide, as president of the regency, addressed a communication to Gainza, in which he declared that Guatemala, instead of attempting to remain independent, ought to unite with Mexico to form a great em- pire; that Guatemala was, in fact, incompetent to govern her- self ; and that, as it might fall a victim to foreign ambition, a strong Mexican army was already marching southward to give it protection. While Iturbide's designs were made manifest by this letter, his agents and partisans, who were growing in number, set on foot an agitation to bring about their realization. Late in No- vember, 1821, the Guatemalan junta, which now included in its membership representatives of the other provinces, resolved to lay the proposal of union before all the municipal govern- ments and request them to take the sense of their several com- munities upon it. Thirty days were allowed for their replies ; and, when the returns received by the end of that period were canvassed, it was found that a majority were in favor of im- mediate annexation. Thereupon, without waiting for the re- sponses of a number of municipalities, the junta, in spite of its previous announcement that it would commit the question ss G6mez Carrillo, Compendio de Bistoria de la America Central 163-171. oe Alam&n, Bistoria de Mexico, V, 346. Digitized by Microsoft® FORMATION OF NEW STATES 75 to a congress for final decision, declared, on January 5, 1822, that the provinces of Central America were henceforth " in- corporated " in the empire of Mexico. This hasty action was deemed necessary in order to avoid a civil war, which would, it was feared, destroy the political harmony which the provinces had so long enjoyed under a common government. Moreover, the incorporation was agreed to on condition that, if the prov- inces should in future find it practicable to constitute an inde- pendent state, they were to be permitted to do so. 60 Although action of the junta was generally acquiesced in, San Salvador disputed its legality and prepared to maintain her independence by force. Gainza, acting in the name of the empire, attempted to reduce the province to submission and an armed conflict ensued. Shortly afterward General Filisola, who had been appointed by the Mexican government as captain- general with full military and political power over the newly acquired territory, arrived on the scene, and, desiring to end the conflict without further bloodshed, arranged an armistice and entered into negotiations with the authorities of the recalci- trant province ; but, after some months of fruitless negotiations, he resolved to settle the difficulty by arms. Victorious in a number of encounters, he took the capital and finally compelled the remnant of the republican army to capitulate. 61 But the victory proved to be fruitless ; for, a month after the war was brought to a close, the fall of the empire made inevitable the reestablishment of Central American independence. Of San Salvador's resistance to forcible annexation to Mex- ico, there was an incident which merits a passing notice. Dur- ing the negotiations between Filisola and the Salvadorean gov- ernment, the latter proposed to unite with Mexico on condi- tions which would be disclosed to the Mexican congress alone. Filisola refused to transmit the proposal without full knowl- eo Marure, Bosguejo Histdrico, I, 31-38. For the act of incorporation, see Ibid., Appendix, doc. 2. «! Marure, Bosque jo Histdrico, I, 50-51. Digitized by Microsoft® 76 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS edge of its terms, and, in conformity with his instructions, de- manded that the Salvadoreans lay down their arms as a condi- tion preliminary to any form of accommodation. 62 The con- gress of San Salvador replied by an Act providing for annexa- tion to the United States, and declaring that in the name of the latter the attack of the Mexican forces would be repelled. 68 This move produced upon Filisola no deterrent effect. On the contrary, adverting to the fact that Mexico was at peace with the United States, and declaring the opinion that territory be- longing to the empire would not be admitted into the Anglo- American federation without a previous agreement between the two governments, he proceeded with his military operations. Nevertheless, the measure encouraged the Salvadoreans to con- tinue their resistance, in the belief that succor would soon come to them from the United States. At one time, indeed, a base- less rumor prevailed that American warships were actually on the way to protect the province and redress its wrongs. 64 Nor is it to be inferred that San Salvador, in invoking the protection of the United States, was moved solely by opposition to incorporation into the Mexican Empire. The fact that the congress dispatched three commissioners to the United States with full powers to conclude an arrangement would appear to indicate that the proposal of union was not a mere makeshift. The commissioners landed at Boston in May, 1823, and pro- ceeded later to Washington. 65 Meanwhile the situation in Mex- ico had changed. Iturbide had abdicated, and, a republic hav- ing succeeded the empire, a more generous conception of liberty had come to prevail. The Mexican congress, acknowledging the right of the Central American provinces to determine for 82 Hid., I, 48. Garcia, Documentos para la Historia de Miwico, XXXVI, 150-154. as Moore, Digest of International Law, I, 583, citing Clay, Secretary of State to Williams, charge d'affaires to the Federation of the Center of America, February 10, 1826. Mas. Inst, to Ministers, XI, 5. "Marure, Bosquejo Eistdrico, I, 49. eo Torrens to Alamfln, May 31, 1823; La Diplomacia Mexioana, II, 10. Digitized by Microsoft® FORMATION OF NEW STATES 77 themselves their future political status, accorded them a free choice as to withdrawal from the union ; and San Salvador cast in its fortunes with those of the other Central American states. 66 During the interval of several months between the fall of the Mexican Empire and the definite establishment of the Central American Republic, the Salvadorean commissioners remained in the United States, apparently awaiting further instructions. Torrens, the Mexican charge d'affaires at Washington, kept his government advised regarding their movements. In a dispatch dated August 21, 1823, 67 he reported that he had talked with two of the commissioners, Arce and Rodriguez, 68 who informed him that since Mexico had become a republic they preferred union with it, and that their colleague, Castillo, had set out for the Mexican capita] to inform himself respecting the situa- tion there and to discover the attitude of the new regime toward San Salvador. In the same dispatch, Torrens stated that the commissioners were generally regarded as representing not a part but the whole of the ancient kingdom of Guatemala, and had been treated by the pu>dic with great cordiality ; and that, even if San Salvador shouldl as they desired, decide in favor of union with Mexico, tkey4iad intended to approach the gov- ernment at Washington at least for the purpose of explaining why the plan of annexation to the United States had been abandoned. He further stated, however, that one of them, Arce, had just departed in great haste for New York under circumstances calculated to arouse suspicion ; that he had been «8 Moore, op. cit., I, 582. 67 La Diplomaoia Mexicana, II, 20. 68 In his dispatch of May 31, cited above, Torrens declared that four com- missioners had arrived; namely, Rafael Castillo, Manuel Jose Arce, Juan Manuel Rodriguez, and Cayetano Vedoya. A fifth, Manuel Zelago, Torrens learned, had died at sea on the way to the United States. Apparently, however, not all of these were commissioned to treat with the United States on the subject of annexation. Marure mentions only one commissioner, Rodriguez. Valladares, in his biographical sketch of Arce (Prdceres de U lndependencia) refers to Arce's activities in the United States, but does not mention the question of annexation. Clay, in his instructions to Williams says that there were three commissioners, but does not mention their names. Digitized by Microsoft® 78 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS commissioning military and naval officers and had at his dis- posal, either at Boston or New York, an armed vessel and a quantity of military supplies. Torrens was thus induced to believe that the Americans had persuaded Arce to lead an ex- pedition to Central America with a view to annex to the United States not only San Salvador but all the other Central Amer- ican provinces. The expedition never set out, if indeed it was ever seriously contemplated by any one. A month later Tor- rens informed his government that the commissioners had re- turned to San Salvador. 69 Although they had received en- couragement from private individuals, yet persons in authority appear to have manifested but little interest in their mission. They, in fact, left the country without having seen either the President or the Secretary of State. 70 In June, 1823, a congress met at the city of Guatemala, and, although composed of representatives of but two provinces, Guatemala and San Salvador, declared, on July 1, the former captaincy-general of Guatemala, as a whole, to be independent of Mexico and of all other powers ; adopting as the title of the new nation the " United Provinces of the Center of America," in the hope that the other provinces would join the federa- tion. 71 San Salvador from the first bore a leading part in the formation of the new state. The president of the congress and two members of the triumvirate, to which the executive author- ity was provisionally entrusted, were Salvadoreans. Possibly these developments may have had an influence in causing San Salvador to abandon any thought of annexation to the United States. Owing, however, to the infrequency of communica- «» According to Valladares (Proceres de la Independencia, 99), Arce sailed from New York on October 18, bound for Tampico in the interest of a scheme which he had been promoting in the United States for the libera- tion of Cuba. 70 Torrens to Alamfin, September 18, 1823; La Diplomacia Mexicam, II, 32. uMarure, Bosquejo Histdrico, I, 62 ff. For the declaration of July 1, see ibid. Appendix, doc. 4, Digitized by Microsoft® FORMATION OF NEW STATES 79 tion, the events took place long before they were known to the Salvadorean commissioners. Honduras, Nicaragua, and Costa Rica, as was expected, soon united their fortunes with those of Guatemala and San Sal- vador; and in December, 1823, a congress, composed of rep- resentatives of all the provinces, adopted the bases of a federal constitution, in accordance with whose provisions the provinces were erected into states and a national government was organ- ized. In November, 1824, a definitive constitution was adopted and promulgated. 72 Modeled in its essential principles upon the constitution of the United States, 73 it contained some im- portant; departures from that instrument, due in part, as in Mexico, to the influence of the Spanish constitution, and in part to the influence of local conditions. It especially provided that the republic should be known as the " Federation of Cen- tral America." This provision, however, was not strictly ob- served in state papers, the old title being occasionally used, and, with yet greater frequency, the variant, " Federated Republic of Central America." 74 A presidential election was held in 1824, in advance of the formal adoption of the constitution. There were two candi- dates for the office. One of these was Jose del Valle, a man of learning, and an able advocate of American unity. The other was Manuel Jose de Arce, the Salvadorean whose activi- ties in the United States during the summer of 1823 have been mentioned. The election resulted in a contest which was not resolved until February, 1825, when the first congress under the constitution decided in Arce's favor. On the face of the returns, Valle appears to have received a majority of the 72 For the constitution, see Gaceta del Gooierno Supremo de Guatemala, No. 1. A translation is found in British and Foreign State Papers, XIII, 725-747. "Marure, Bosquejo Eist&rico, I, 112 ff. "i* See, for example, the treaty concluded, March 15, 1825, and December 5, 1825, with Colombia and the United States respectively. Marure, Bos- quejo Eist&rico, I, Appendix, doc. 10. Digitized by Microsoft® 80 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS electoral vote, and the action of the congress not unnaturally embittered him; but, unfortunately, his hostility to the new administration was but one of the many factors that produced in the new republic a serious state of discord. 75 Conflicts be- tween state and national authorities, local quarrels of long standing, personal animosities, the alliance of the president with the enemies of the constitution, 76 and the general tendency to disregard the provisions of that instrument rapidly brought about a condition of affairs bordering upon anarchy. Oppo- sition to Arce finally became so strong that he was obliged to resign. His retirement, however, did not save the situation. Order was not restored ; and although the federation nominally continued to exist until 1839, 77 it had long before that time fallen into practical dissolution. Briefly summarizing our account of the formation of the new American states, we have seen that, upon the ruins of the Euro- pean colonial systems then remaining in the New World, there were erected, during the second and third decades of the nine- teenth century, eleven independent powers. One of these, Haiti, successor to the colony which the French had long main- tained in the western part of Santo Domingo, was later tem- porarily extended by conquest over the eastern part of the island, where, except for a short period, Spanish control had been supreme. Another, the empire of Brazil, embraced the whole of the vast Portuguese territory in the continent of South America. The rest — Mexico, Central America, Colom- bia, Peru, Bolivia, Chile, the United Provinces of Rio de la Plata, Uruguay, and Paraguay, all of Spanish origin — formed an unbroken chain of independent states extending from the northern limits of California to the southernmost bounds of Chile and the Argentine. As between the nations of this group, composed of former colonies of Spain, abundant evidence has 75 Marure, Bosque jo Histdrlco, I, 93, 139. 7» Valladares (Prdceres de la Independencia, 112 ff.) presents Arce in a more favorable light. t> G6mez Carrillo, Compendia de Historia de la America Central, 202. Digitized by Microsoft® FORMATION OF NEW STATES 81 been adduced of the existence of a unity of purpose during the struggle for independence. As colonies they had been subject for three hundred years to a common rule ; they had a common ethnic origin; they spoke a common language; they were in- fluenced by common social traditions and practices ; and finally, they achieved their independence in a common struggle against a common enemy. Their cohesion was therefore the natural result of causes which operated only indirectly, in the forma- tion of the more inclusive sentiment of Pan-Americanism. It remains to be seen what were the forces that drew together the nations of the Western Hemisphere irrespective of political origin, of racial composition, of religion, of customs, or or lan- guage. To make this clear will be the purpose of the succeed- ing chapters. Digitized by Microsoft® CHAPTER III FAILURE OF MONARCHICAL PLOTS Some reference has been made in the preceding chapter to the efforts of San Martin to set up an independent monarchy in Peru, and the history of Mexico's experiment as an empire under Iturbide has also been briefly related. Whether the new states should adopt the republican or the monarchical form of government was a question of vital importance; for, if the lat- ter form had prevailed, and if dynastic connections had been maintained by the new governments with the reigning houses of Europe, the development of a separate political system on this continent would have been impossible. The subject, there- fore, deserves further consideration. Although the series of revolutions which took place through- out Hispanic America during the second and third decades of the last century did undoubtedly involve, from the first, an idea of separation from the mother country, yet the movements were not aimed primarily at the attainment of independence. Hence there was little thought, in the beginning, of the form of government most convenient to adopt. The conception of absolute freedom from European control and of an independent existence under a republican regime was slowly evolved out of the struggle. Moreover, loyalty to the Spanish sovereign was a remarkable characteristic of the revolution in its early stages. Napoleon's usurpation of the throne of Spain met with scant sympathy or support in the Spanish dominions in America. On the contrary, the colonial authorities, on hearing of the emperor's designs, proclaimed Eerdinand VII as their lawful king and established relations with the revolutionary junta, which had been formed in Seville to govern in the name of the 82 Digitized by Microsoft® FAILURE OF MONARCHICAL PLOTS 83 captive monarch. In some quarters, however, doubt was ex- pressed as to the right of that body to exercise supreme author- ity and, in 1810 when the junta was forcibly dissolved, there followed, generally, a movement in the colonies to establish governmental committees owning no superior authority in the mother country. Still these provisional governments professed to act in the name of Ferdinand VII. 1 In spite of the general indifference toward independence, there were numerous leaders throughout Spanish America who looked forward to and labored to establish, a new order of things. Among these was the Chilean, Juan Martinez de Rozas, whose work may be mentioned to illustrate the conflict, which must have been going on in the minds of many, between loyalty to the Spanish king and the desire for a free national existence. In 1810 there were circulated in Chile 2 manuscript copies — there was no printing press in the province at that time — of a pamphlet entitled " Politico-Christian catechism arranged for the instruction of the free peoples of South America," of which Rozas was believed to be the author. After considering the evils of a monarchy in all its forms he concluded that " a democratic-republican government in which the people rule by means of representatives or deputies whom they elect is the only government which preserves the dignity and majesty of a people; brings men nearest the equality in which God has created them; is least exposed to the horrors of despotism and arbitrariness; is the most moderate, the freest, and therefore the best calculated to make rational beings happy." And yet he recommended that a government be constituted in the name of Ferdinand VII, because that unfortunate prince merited the sympathy and the tender consideration of every American heart. If Ferdinand should not return to his throne, however, Rozas believed that a government should be formed free from the control of " usurping kings, or of the English, or of Prin- 1 Villanueva, Besumen de la Historia de America, 212-218. 2 Barros Arana, Historia Jeneral de Chile, VII, 184, 185. Digitized by Microsoft® 84 PAN-AMERJCANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS cess Charlotte, or of the Portuguese, or of foreign domination of any kind whatever." 8 By the time the restoration of Ferdinand had been effected in 1814, the inevitable drift of the revolution toward independ- ence had attained irrepressible momentum. Moreover, the re- actionary attitude of Ferdinand seriously impaired what re- mained of the traditional loyalty to Spain and inclined the colonies more decidedly toward independence. On the other hand, the success of the Boyalist arms and the growing anarchy within the Patriot ranks led many of the leaders of the revolu- tion to believe that independence was not to be achieved, nor internal order and tranquillity restored except through the pro- tection of some powerful nation, or through the rule of a prince of some one or another of the reigning families of Europe. This was the condition of affairs especially in the United Provinces of Kio de la Plata. There the masses of the people warmly championed the idea of a federal republic, but many of the leaders were of the opinion that a constitutional monarchy was the only form of government capable of meeting the ex- traordinary conditions which had arisen. Accordingly two agents, Manuel Belgrano and Bernardino Eivadavia, were com- missioned to proceed to Europe with secret instructions to se- cure independence by negotiating the establishment of a con- stitutional monarchy with a Spanish or an English prince as sovereign; or in their default one of any other powerful house of Europe. 4 They were further instructed to go by way of s Reference is here made to the different proposals which had been made for the disposition of the Spanish colonies. * Neither Rivadavia nor Belgrano, according to Mitre, was at heart a monarchist, as the sum total of their public life goes to show. In speak- ing of this chimerical mission, Mitre says: " These two great citizens, the two loftiest representatives of Argentine democracy, always admired and supported one another and continued, until separated by death, in their mutual esteem. Misled for the moment in their political principles, this passing error, motived by their love of the public welfare involves a moral lesson, which teaches to what extent contemporary happenings may becloud the minds of the most intelligent and lead astray the moral sense of even the most noble characters." Mitre, Historia de Sam Martin, II, 285. Digitized by Microsoft® FAILURE OF MONARCHICAL PLOTS 85 Rio de Janeiro and there to open negotiations with Lord Strang- ford, British minister at the court of Brazil. Shortly after the departure of these agents the Director of the United Provinces resigned and was succeeded by Carlos Alvear. The new Director appointed Manuel Jose Garcia con- fidential agent to the court of Brazil with instructions to co- operate in the task intrusted to Belgrano and Rivadavia. In the face of serious internal disorders, which the acts of Alvear himself had served to aggravate, it was deemed expedient to take steps to place the United Provinces under the protection of Great Britain. Garcia was made the bearer of two notes, one of which was addressed to the British Minister of Foreign Af- fairs. In this note Alvear declared that the provinces desired to belong to Great Britain; that they wished to receive her laws; to obey her government and to live under her powerful influence ; that they placed implicit trust in the generosity and good faith of the English people. 5 The note closed with an urgent request that troops be sent to restore order and that some person of authority and standing be designated to take charge of the colony and begin to mold the country to the will of the British king and nation. The second note was addressed to Lord Strangford, and in matter and form was of similar pur- port to the one directed to the Foreign Office at London. 6 Garcia arrived at Rio early in 1815. Though he shared with Alvear the opinion that it would be better in the last extremity to surrender the colony to England than to submit again to the domination of Spain, he was not convinced, as was Alvear, that the situation had become hopeless. Counseled by Rivadavia, to whom he confided his instructions, and comprehending the gravity of the proposed step, which partook somewhat of the Barros Arana says that both were republicans in character, habits, and principles. He expresses the opinion that the majority of the leaders were likewise, by instinct and conviction, believers in the republican system. Uistoria Jeneral de Chile, XII, 24-25. s Mitre, Eistoria de Belgrano, II, 261 (ed. 1902) . 8 Mitre, Historic, de Belgrano, II, 256-261. Digitized by Microsoft® 86 PAN-AMEEICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS nature of a criminal act, to use his own characterization, Gar- cia resolved to disobey his instructions. In accordance with this resolution he withheld the note directed to the British minister at Bio and presented the matter to him orally, in a less humiliating form. But Garcia found that Lord Strang- ford not only lacked authority to negotiate, but had been in- structed by his government to act in harmony with Spain in matters relating to the war in America. Thus, disappointed in their first efforts 7 the commissioners set out for England, where they arrived in May, 1815. A more unfavorable time for treating with Great Britain could scarcely be imagined. The whole of Europe was in arms against Napo- leon, who, having shortly before escaped from the island of Elba, had again assumed the crown of France. Since the prin- ciple of legitimacy was being strongly invoked in the new strug- gle against the emperor, it was clear that England was not in a position to give encouragement to a plan which would have been in direct violation of that principle. Moreover, by the terms of the treaty of July 5, 1814, between Great Britain and Spain, of whose existence the Argentine agents appear to have been ignorant until their arrival in England, the two countries entered into an alliance in consequence of which they agreed to forward by all possible means their respective interests. 8 On August 28 of the same year additional articles were signed, the third article of which was as follows : " His Britannic Majesty being anxious that the troubles and disturbances which 7 It appears that the commissioners during their stay at Rio de Janeiro entered into negotiations with the Brazilian chancellery and that on Jan- uary 15, 1815, an agreement was reached which was to serve later as the basis of new negotiations. According to this agreement, Brazil was to be permitted to occupy, with- out resistance on the part of Buenos Aires, the Banda Oriental, and the government of Buenos Aires engaged to see that the congress should seek annexation to Brazil, thus forming an independent empire under the scepter of the Prince Regent of Brazil, who should take the title of the Emperor of South America. Villanueva, Bolivar y El General San Martin, 31-32; 52-57. s British and Foreign State Papers, 1814, 1, 273. Digitized by Microsoft® FAILURE OF MONARCHICAL PLOTS 87 unfortunately prevail in the dominions of his Catholic Majesty in America should entirely cease, and the subjects of those provinces should return to their obedience to their lawful sov- ereign, engages to take the most effectual measures for pre- venting his subjects from furnishing arms, ammunition, or any other warlike article to the revolted in America." 9 It was evident, therefore, that no help was to be obtained from England. Under the circumstances the Argentine commissioners, ac- cepting the advice of Manuel Sarratea, 10 resident agent of the Buenos Aires Government in London, resolved to forego all efforts to treat with the government of Great Britain or that of Spain, and instead to open negotiations with the deposed Span- ish king, Charles IV, who was at the time domiciled in Rome. Charles IV, it will be recalled, had been forced to abdicate, as a result of the rebellion of Aranjuez, shortly before the Na- poleonic invasion of Spain, and the Prince of Asturias had been proclaimed as Ferdinand VII. During the occupation of Spain by the armies of Napoleon, Charles and Ferdinand, as well as other members of the royal family, were held as pris- oners in France. By the treaty of Valengay, 11 the crown of Spain was restored to Ferdinand, who being released returned to his kingdom in the spring of 1814. The regency and the Cortes, representing the liberal element of the population, had » IUd., 292. io Sarratea, who, according to Mitre, was a man of versatility, a gifted conversationalist, a consummate political speculator, not lacking in ability or breadth of view, suffered the least illusion of any of those concerned in the project, with respect to its desirability or the possibility of realizing it, though he was its real author. He entered upon the affair merely as an interesting adventure. Historia de Belgrano, II, 277. " After the invasion of Spain in 1808 Ferdinand was held as a prisoner at Valengay. Charles was detained at Marseilles. Toward the end of 1813 the continued success of the allies drove Napoleon to enter into negotia- tions with Ferdinand, in the hope that by restoring him to the throne of Spain he might embroil that power with its British ally. A treaty was concluded on December 11, 1813, which stipulated, among other things, that Ferdinand should be recognized by the emperor as King of Spain and the Indies. Alison, History of Europe, XII, 423, 426. Digitized by Microsoft® 88 PAN-AMEKICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS refused to ratify the treaty, and they were opposed to recog- nizing Ferdinand except on condition that he swear to the con- stitution of 1812. But the Liberals were a small minority. The great mass of the people acclaimed Ferdinand, and soon he was recognized on all sides as the lawful king. 12 After the fall of Napoleon there was no disposition on the part of the powers to insist upon the return of Charles IV to the throne, although his abdication was originally brought about and was afterward maintained by force, in violation of the principle of legitimacy. Charles, therefore, left without support from any quarter, signed, January 14, 1815, a species of family pact in the form of a declaration renouncing forever in favor of Ferdinand VII all claims to the throne of Spain. 13 But it was thought that this agreement, ratified as it was at the moment of Napoleon's triumphant return, lacked binding force ; that the very fact of the coalition of the powers against Napoleon placed Charles in a position of vantage, for, in order to be consistent with their declarations and maintain in all its vigor the principle of legitimacy, the members of the coali- tion could not fail to recognize him as the lawful King of Spain. Moreover, a failure of the allies to support him might result in his being thrown into the arms of Napoleon. The commissioners proposed, therefore, first, to obtain from Charles IV a declaration as sovereign recognizing the separa- tion of the colonies from Spain and constituting two or more independent monarchies upon whose thrones should be placed Spanish princes; secondly, to induce Charles to communicate the plan to the sovereigns of Europe and to request them to support it against the opposition of Ferdinand VII. It was believed that in this way the hostility of the absolutist govern- ments of Europe could be overcome, and at a single stroke in- dependence attained and the war ended. From the standpoint 12 Cambridge Modem History, X, 212. 13 British and Foreign State Papers, 1814, II, 873. Digitized by Microsoft® FAILURE OF MONARCHICAL PLOTS 89 of European politics, the plan was not lacking in plausibility, for it offered a solution based on legitimacy. Nevertheless, it was destined to failure. Before the negotiations were well un- der way Napoleon's power had been destroyed, and in view of this turn of affairs Charles IV refused outright to give the scheme his approval, thus bringing the negotiations to an abrupt end. 14 This venture having failed, Belgrano returned to America, leaving Rivadavia to continue negotiations in Europe. In March, 1816, shortly after Belgrano's arrival at Buenos Aires, the congress of Tucuman convened to consider a number of questions of vital importance to the provinces, among them being the declaration of independence and the form of govern- ment to be adopted. It must be remembered that the inde- pendence of the Buenos Aires Government, though actually an accomplished fact, had not yet been expressly declared. This step had been awaiting the selection of the form of government, for upon that would depend the question of recognition and the possibility of forming much desired alliances. Belgrano, strongly impressed by the course of events in Europe, declared in a secret session of the congress that the whole tendency of European politics was toward monarchy and away from re- publicanism. He had become convinced, however, of the de- sirability of separation from Spain, and he accordingly recom- mended the immediate declaration of independence. As to the form of government he inclined toward monarchy and he sug- gested the resuscitation of the ancient Inca empire, by erecting a throne at Cuzco and placing upon it a descendant of the Inca kings. The congress accepted this recommendation with ref- erence to the declaration of independence, a resolution to that effect being passed on July 9, but though the body was over- whelmingly in favor of the principle of monarchy, it rejected the proposal for the restoration of the Inca dynasty, as there I* Mitre, Historia de Belgrano, II, 271-282. Digitized by Microsoft® 90 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS were other schemes under consideration which appeared to be more feasible. 15 One of the first acts of the congress of Tucuman was the election of Juan Martin de Pueyrredon as supreme director of the United Provinces. Pueyrredon on assuming the directorate became interested in the promotion of plans for the conversion of the government of the provinces into a monarchy. As early as 1808, when Napoleon usurped the crown of Spain, Princess Charlotte, wife of the prince regent of Brazil and sister of Ferdinand VII, had begun to intrigue to get possession of the Spanish dominions in America, 16 considering them lost to Spain. Out of these intrigues grew a number of proposals, among which was one to create in Buenos Aires a monarchy with Princess Charlotte as regent. But this and other similar schemes being opposed by Great Britain, as the ally of Spain and virtual pro- tector of Portugal, came to- nothing, though they did not lack supporters among the American subjects of Ferdinand, par- ticularly in Buenos Aires. 17 The idea of establishing some sort of political connection be- tween the governments of Rio de Janeiro and Buenos Aires was kept alive. Shortly before the congress of Tucuman de- clared the independence of the united provinces, a communica- tion was received from Garcia proposing that the King of Por- tugal be recognized as sovereign. The congress after consider- ation appointed a special agent to negotiate with the Brazilian court on the basis of the following alternative projects: First, is Mitre, Historia de Belgrano, II, 329-333. i« According to a report made by Joel It. Poinsett to the State Depart- ment, November 4, 1818, on his mission to South America, manifestoes were published by the Infante dom Pedro, nephew of Charles IV of Spain, and by the Infanta Carlota setting forth their right to the Spanish dominions in America. These manifestoes were accompanied by letters addressed to the viceroy and governors of provinces and were circulated from Buenos Aires to Mexico. Am. State Papers, For. Bel., IV, 342-3. See also Barros Arana, Historia de Chile, VIII, 92-100. i? Villanueva, La Monarquia en America: Bolivar y el General San Mar- tin, 10-17. Mitre, Historia de Belgrano, II, 201-205; III, 188-192. Digitized by Microsoft® FAILURE OF MONARCHICAL PLOTS 91 the reestablishment of the Inca dynasty and the union of that dynasty with the house of Braganza; secondly, the crowning in the United Provinces of a Brazilian prince or some European prince not Spanish who would marry a Brazilian princess ; and finally, as a last resort, the recognition of the King of Portugal on condition that he remain on American soil. The agent des- ignated, however, did not accept the post and the Director, under authority of the congress, continued the negotiations, employing for the purpose as before the agent, Garcia. 18 Pueyrredon, though born in Buenos Aires, was the son of a Frenchman and having been educated in France naturally felt a predilection for that nation. Though he continued ne- gotiations with Brazil, 19 he turned his attention preferably to the prosecution of plans aimed at placing a French prince upon the prospective throne of the united provinces. It appears that about this time he received proposals in connection with a plot which had as its object the establishment of a great His- pano-American confederation, at the head of which was to be placed Joseph Bonaparte, who had not, it seems, abdicated his title of King of the Indies. 20 The promoters of this scheme were exiled followers of the Great Napoleon. 21 They proposed to raise a body of Indian troops in the western part of the United States, invade Mexico, and once in possession of that country, extend their operations to the colonies further south. The French minister at Washington, Hyde de Neuville, having learned of the plot, entered a protest to the Secretary of State against its further prosecution on the ground of the violation of neutrality. He was joined in this protest by the ministers of Great Britain and Spain. The American Government took is Villanueva, Bolivar y el Oeneral San Martin, 51-57. is Mitre, Eistoria de Belgrano, III, 310-326. 20 Villanueva, Resumen de la Historia de America, 253. 2i The scholar and statesman, Lakanal, Marshal Clauzel, and General Des- monettes are mentioned by Villanueva. (Bolivar y el General San Martin, 59.) A colony of French exiles received from congress a grant of land Digitized by Microsoft® 92 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS steps to comply with its obligations, and whether for this reason or some other the scheme was soon abandoned. 22 Hyde de Neuville, having the opportunity to note the de- velopment of the revolution in the Spanish colonies and be- lieving its success to be inevitable, unless Spain changed her colonial policy, recommended to the Due de Richelieu that two constitutional monarchies be set up in America; one in the region of the Rio de la Plata and the other in Mexico. 23 These two monarchies, backed by that of Brazil, would be able, he thought, to smother the insurrection in the rest of the colonies, destroy the spirit of republicanism wherever it existed, and put an end to the predominance of Washington and London in the affairs of Spanish America. He supported his recommendation as to Mexico by an observation of the French consul at Balti- more to the effect that unless Mexico were given a Bourbon king it would fall under the direct influence of the United States and thus be lost to Europe ; and as to the United Provinces, by a statement of Secretary Adams to the effect that within a few months the United States would be obliged to recognize their independence. Richelieu favored the plan of Hyde de Neu- ville and discussed it with the representatives of the powers. In August, 1818, he proposed to Spain that either the Prince of Lucca or the infante, Erancisco de Paula, be crowned at Buenos Aires; and he offered to take the matter before the congress which was soon to meet at Aix-la-Chapelle, 24 if Spain so desired. But the negotiations failed, for Ferdinand VII maintained an uncompromising attitude, proudly refusing to acknowledge that he was powerless to prevent the further dis- integration of his crumbling empire. 25 on the Tombigbee River in Alabama and settled there in the winter and spring of 1816-1817. Pickett, History of Alabama, 623-633. 22 Adams, J. Q., Memoirs, IV, 9, 19, 20. 23 Villanueva, Bolivar y el General Ban Martin, 62, citing Hyde de Neu- ville to Richelieu, May 14, 1817. 24 Villanueva, Bolivar y el General San Martin, 83-88. 25 Other efforts were made to extend the influence of this congress to the Spanish colonies, but they were defeated by the stubborn attitude of Fer- Digitized by Microsoft® FAILURE OF MONARCHICAL PLOTS 93 While these negotiations were going on in Europe, Pueyrre- don and his colleagues were taking steps at Buenos Aires which were intended to lead to a definite agreement with France. After an unsuccessful attempt to communicate directly with the Due de Richelieu, Pueyrredon received an agent, Le Moyne, by name, of the French Government who had been sent to Buenos Aires by the Marquis of Osmond, French ambassador at London, for the purpose of counteracting the influence of the Bonapartists who were in the councils of Pueyrredon, and of announcing that Europe would view with extreme repugnance the establishment of a republic in South America. In Sep- tember, 1818, Le Moyne reported to Osmond 26 that the Buenos Aires Government was strongly in favor of a close political connection with France, that San Martin and Belgrano, who were formerly partisans of England, were now convinced that France offered greater advantages; that the monarchical sys- tem was generally preferred to the republican ; that Chile and Peru would immediately unite with a monarchy set up at Buenos Aires; that the constitution which was at that time in preparation was being given as strong a monarchical charac- ter as circumstances would permit; and finally, that if a mon- archy were negotiated the Duke of Orleans would be acceptable as sovereign. 27 Early in 1819, at the instance of Pueyrredon, Le Moyne returned to Europe to report in person upon the favorable dis- position of the Buenos Aires Government. He was followed shortly afterward by Jose Valentin Gomez, 28 who was author- dinand VII and the opposition of Great Britain. Cambridge Modern His- tory, X, 19. 26 Villanueva, Bolivar y el General San Martin, 91-96; 109-121. " Afterward King Louis Philippe of France. * 28 In his credentials it was declared " that the state of affairs in Europe and America had led to the decision to appoint Sefior Gr6mez near the courts of Europe with authority to establish his residence at Paris, Sefior Riva- davia returning to London; and that he was empowered to negotiate and make proposals to the ministry of France to the end of causing the cessa- tion of the hostilities which were inundating with blood the provinces of Bio de la Plata, which deserved a better fate. For this result the native Digitized by Microsoft® 94 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS ized by Pueyrredon to negotiate with the French Government the establishment of an Orleanist monarchy with its seat at Buenos Aires. France, however, was not in a position which would enable her to follow an independent course in a matter of such great importance, for she was not yet free from re- strictions placed by the powers on her freedom of action. 29 Dessolle, successor of the Due de Richelieu, therefore renewed negotiations at Madrid with a view to obtaining the agreement of Spain to the erection of a monarchy in the region of the Rio de la Plata with a Spanish prince as sovereign, though this procedure was not approved by Gomez. Failing to win the consent of Ferdinand, Dessolle proposed to Gomez as candi- date for the Argentine throne Charles Louis of Bourbon, Prince of Lucca, and grandson of Charles IV of Spain. It is not clear whether Dessolle made this proposal, so close upon the heels of his failure at Madrid, merely as a device to prevent Gomez from treating with some other court, or whether he made it sincerely in the expectation, as he averred, of securing the cooperation of Russia and Austria in inducing Ferdinand to accept. 30 Gomez objected to the candidacy of the Prince of Lucca on the ground that while it might facilitate the negotiation with Madrid, it would have an opposite effect in Buenos Aires, where a Spanish prince, he thought, would not be acceptable. Never- theless he communicated the scheme to his government, and the matter was laid, by the Director, before the congress. On November 12, 1819, this body voted to accept the project un- der conditions which may be briefly summarized as follows: That the Eing of France would agree to obtain the consent of the great powers of Europe and especially of England and Spain; that he would use his influence to effect the union of inhabitants were crying out, longing for the moment of this happy meta- morphosis, though resolved to maintain to the last their independence." Mitre, op. tit., Ill, 331. 29 Cambridge Modern History, X, 18. so Villanueva, BoUvar y el General San Martin, 127-146, Digitized by Microsoft® FAILURE OF MONARCHICAL PLOTS 95 the Prince of Lucca with a Brazilian princess and to secure the abandonment of the Brazilian claims in the Banda Oriental ; that the new kingdom should embrace at least the territory which constituted formerly the viceroyalty of La Plata; that the constitution already adopted, 31 with such minor changes only as were necessary to adapt it to a monarchical regime, be accepted; that France, in case of resistance on the part of Spain, should engage to furnish the Prince of Lucca with troops to carry out the enterprise; and that if England offered armed opposition the project should be abandoned. 32 The events which followed made the realization of the scheme im- possible. In the United Provinces the period of relative order under the directorate of Pueyrredon was followed by an increase of unrest resulting in civil war. Rondeau, who succeeded Puey- rredon upon the adoption of the constitution of 1819, was like his predecessor, of French descent and partial to France and a monarchy. Taking the field against the rebels he was de- feated by them in February, 1820, and compelled to resign. Sarratea, whose activities in London have been noticed above, now assumed the office of governor of the province of Buenos Aires. Championing the cause of republicanism he published a pamphlet 33 exposing the intrigues of the monarchists. This si The constitution was promulgated on May 25, 1819. In the manifesto recommending it to the people, the state was thus described : " It is not the democracy of Athens, nor the regime of Sparta, nor the patrician aris- tocracy or the plebeian effervescence of Rome, nor the absolute government of Russia, nor the despotism of Turkey, nor the complicated confederation of some other states. It is a state midway between democratic convulsion and the abuse of limited power." But as a compromise between these extremes it was not a success, giving satisfaction to neither party. Mitre, Historia de Belgrano, III, 333-335. For the constitution of 1819 and the manifesto see Lemoult, Constitution des Provinces Unies de I'Amerique du Sud ( Paris, 1819). 32 Villanueva, Bolivar y el General San Martin, 146-151. Mitre, His- toria de Belgrano, III, 335 (ed. 1902). 33 Proceso original justifieativo contra los reos acusados de alta traicidn en el Gongreso y Directorio, Buenos Aires, 1820. Cf, Blanco- Azpurua Documentos, VII, 110-127. Digitized by Microsoft® 96 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS publication was inspired, it was believed, by the partisans of England in Buenos Aires, Sarratea himself being among this number. The supporters of the candidacy of the Prince of Lucca being thus driven from office were unable to carry the negotiations forward. And if this had not been the case, fail- ure would have been inevitable in Europe ; for, apart from the fact that France failed to receive the expected support from the Holy Alliance, England, informed of the project, made known her hostility and would have been able, no doubt, to interpose successful resistance to its execution, had it been per- sisted in. Though the idea of a monarchy was not yet com- pletely banished from Argentine soil, there were henceforth to be no more official efforts to establish that system of govern- ment there. 34 The projects which have just been considered, although they were put forward with reference mainly to the provinces of the Rio 1 de la Plata, yet extended in scope to Chile and Peru. The latter, held in strict subjection to the peninsular authori- ties, took no part in the negotiations. Chile, however, while much less inclined to the monarchical system than the United Provinces and usually refraining from active participation in the plans looking to the establishment of that system, did send an agent, 35 Antonio Jose Irisarri, at the solicitation of the government of Buenos Aires, to take part in the negotiations which issued in the candidacy of the Prince of Lucca. Irisarri was instructed to proceed to London and to let it be known in the conferences which he might have with the ministers of England and the ambassadors of the European powers, that it 3* Villanueva, Bolivar y el General San Martin, 151-160. 35 Barros Arana declares that if there was in Chile at this time a deeply rooted sentiment it was that of nationality; that no consideration whatever could have overcome the desire of Chile to form a separate nation; that O'Higgins, in ohedience to national sentiment, would never have lent his sanction to any plan violating that sentiment; and that if this intrigue for establishing a monarchy in Chile had become known there would have been aroused against it a storm of public opinion. Hktoria de Chile, XII, 41, 42. Digitized by Microsoft® FAILURE OF MONARCHICAL PLOTS 97 was the ultimate aim of the government of Chile to adopt the " continental system of Europe " ; that Chile would not be in- disposed to set up a constitutional monarchy, such form of government being better adapted than any other to the legis- lation, customs, conventions, and religious organization of Chile ; but that having no prince to whom the government could be intrusted, the country was willing to accept, subject to the con- stitution which was being framed, a prince of any of the neutral powers, who, under the protection of the dynasty to which he belonged and in the enjoyment of influence derived from relations with European courts, would fix his empire in Chile, thus assuring its independence of Ferdinand VII and of his successors and of every other foreign power. 38 Irisarri, proceeding overland to Buenos Aires on his way to Europe found, after reaching San Luis in the province of Cuyo, that the instructions which had been given him did not bear the signature of the Supreme Director nor of the Minister of Foreign Affairs. Returning the papers therefore to Santiago, to be signed and dispatched to England by sea, he continued his journey. Upon the return of the documents, O'Higgins, who had probably not read the instructions before with care, now refused to sign them, and as no new instructions were drawn up the Chilean envoy was left without a definite guide for his diplomatic functions in Europe. It appears, however, that he put himself in touch with the Argentine agents and sent dispatches to his government concerning the project for crowning the Prince of Lucca at Buenos Aires. It is not clear whether or not he favored the project; for shortly afterward O'Higgins had all the papers referring to the matter burned. 37 ae Barros Arana, Historia de Chile, XII, 48. Mitre, Historic, de San Martin, IV, 486 (ed. 1890). 37 Barros Arana, Historia de Chile, XII, 51, 52. Irisarri left Santiago December 12, 1818, and reached his destination in May, 1819. While in London he was the principal editor of El Censor Americano, which was published in that city from July to October, 1820. Sanchez, BibUografia V ' enezolanista, 176. Villanueva states that Irisarri urged O'Higgins to accept the plan. Digitized by Microsoft® 98 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS It was two years after the failure of this scheme for estab- lishing a monarchy in southern South America with the Prince of Lucca as sovereign, that San Martin, as has been noted above, entered into negotiations with the viceroy of Peru with the aim of securing the recognition of the independence of the viceroyalty through its erection into a kingdom with a Spanish prince on the throne. With the breaking off of these negotia- tions and the retirement of San Martin from Peru before his plans for further negotiations with other reigning houses of Europe had matured, the monarchical form of government came to be regarded by the leaders of opinion in the newly formed states in this section of South America as less suitable to their peculiar needs than the republican form. Some attention must now be given to the northern part of the continent; that is, to Venezuela, New Granada, and Quito. Here republican tendencies were, perhaps, not essentially stronger than in the south, but they found more positive expres- sion in the early years of the struggle. On December 11, 1811, a constituent congress which had been assembled at Caracas adopted for Venezuela a federal constitution similar to that of the United States, though containing certain substantial varia- tions. It is significant that the congress rejected at the same time an aristocratic plan, neither republican nor monarchical, proposed by Francisco de Miranda. 38 A constitution adopted by the " State of Cundinamarca " April 5, 1811, contained elements taken from the constitution of the United States and from that of France under the Directory. This instrument, however, provided that Ferdinand VII should be recognized as head of the state. Shortly afterward, this constitution was overthrown, and on November 27, 1811, an act was adopted constituting the " United Provinces of New Granada," and He does not, however, give his authority. Bolivar y el General Sam Martin, 147. as Robertson, Francisco de Miranda. An. Rep. Am. Hist. Assn. 1907, I, 417-421, 456. Cf. also Gil Fortoul, Historia Constitutional de Venezuela, I, 156-172. Digitized by Microsoft® FAILURE OF MONARCHICAL PLOTS 99 declaring that no official appointed by Spain without the con- sent of the people of New Granada would be recognized. At about the same time Cartagena set up an independent govern- ment under a republican constitution. Quito continued under the authority of Spain until 1822. 39 The years immediately following these first essays in self- government were full of trials and disappointments for the Patriots. They were crushed by the Royalists on every hand. Miranda, who for a brief space was the hope of the revolution, was taken prisoner and transported to Spain, where he died in 1816. Bolivar, though continuing the struggle and winning important victories, was finally compelled to abandon the coun- try. With the exception of a few localities where guerrilla warfare was continued both Venezuela and New Granada fell into the hands of the Royalists. Meanwhile, Bolivar, who had fled to the island of Jamaica and afterward to Haiti, devoted his energies to the organization and development of plans for renewing the war. Of his career as military leader, no more need be said here than to recall the fact that he returned in 1816, after an exile of about a year, at the head of an expedi- tion, fitted out through the magnanimity of President Petion of Haiti; that he overcame tremendous difficulties, gradually making himself master of Venezuela and New Granada, then of Quito and finally of Peru and Bolivia; that in 1821 he was made president of the republic of Colombia, a state nearly equal in area to the part of the United States east of the Missis- sippi ; and that within a little more than a year thereafter he had become the arbiter of the destiny of the Spanish-speaking peoples from the Orinoco to the borders of Chile and the Argen- tine. It will be of interest therefore to study for a moment this great leader's political ideals. During his exile in 1815, Bolivar wrote what has been called his " prophetic letter," setting forth the political principles which he held at the time and which no doubt served in great 39 Villanueva, Resumen, de la Historia de America, 200-237. Digitized by Microsoft® 100 PAN-AMEKICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS measure to guide his conduct during the succeeding eventful years of his lifetime. The letter was written in reply to one received from a person in Jamaica, whose name does not ap- pear, requesting information as to what the political situation in each colony was ; whether preference was being shown for the republican or for the monarchical system, and whether it was desired to establish a single great republic or a monarchy of like extent. 40 The following extract from Bolivar's reply ex- presses his view: " Above all men I desire," he said, " to see formed in Amer- ica the greatest nation on earth ; greatest not so much by virtue of its extent and its wealth, as by virtue of its liberty and its glory. Though I long for a high degree of excellence in the government of my native land, I cannot persuade myself to believe that the New World will, for the present, be organized as a great republic. Since it is impossible to set up such a state I do not dare to wish for it ; and much less do I desire a monarchy embracing the whole of America ; 41 for that is like- wise impossible. Under so great a state it would be impos- sible to correct the abuses which we at present endure, and hence our emancipation would be fruitless. The American states need paternal governments to cure the sores and wounds of despotism and war. If such a general government were organized the metropolis would be Mexico, the only country whose intrinsic strength could give it such a position. But let us suppose it were Panama, which is more central. Would not all the parts continue to be as weak and as badly governed as at present? For a single government to be able to infuse *o The letter was first published in a newspaper of Kingston. From that source General O'Leary obtained it and republished it in his Memoriae, XXVII, 291-309. « The context appears to show that Bolivar here meant Spanish America. Contemporary writers in Spanish frequently used the terms "America" and " Nuevo Mundo " to refer to the former colonies of Spain. In the same way America del Septentridn was sometimes used to designate Mexico. Cf. Alaman, Historic/, de Mexico, V, 587. Digitized by Microsoft® FAILURE OF MONARCHICAL PLOTS 101 life into the New World, touch all the springs of public pros- perity, carry out reforms and, in general, bring about a state of relative perfection, it would need to be possessed of the au- thority of a god and of all the intelligence and virtue of men." 42 A monarchy of such vast proportions, he concludes, would be a deformed colossus which would break to pieces from its own weight upon suffering the least strain. With regard to the kind and number of governments that should be established, Bolivar referred to the fact that the Abbe de Pradt had suggested the division of America into fif- teen or more independent monarchies governed by as many monarchs. As to the number of separate nations he was in agreement with the abbe ; but not so with respect to the nature of the governments that should be given them. Small repub- lics, he thought, were to be preferred because the legitimate sphere of their activity is the pursuit of national welfare and the conservation of independence. Their distinctive mark is permanence, while that of great states is change, with a tend- ency to imperialism. Nearly all small republics, he affirms, have had a long life. The fact that Rome survived some cen- turies as a republic was due to its being governed as a republic at the capital only, other laws and institutions prevailing in the rest of the territory under its sway. 43 Discussing the kinds of government which the different di- visions would be likely to set up he predicted that some would choose the federal republic and others the unitary or central- ized republic; but that the more important sections would in- evitably incline to monarchy. He thought a union of New Granada and Venezuela likely to occur, and he suggested that their government might imitate that of England, with the difference that the executive should be elected, preferably for life. A hereditary senate would check the waves of popular 42-O'Leary, Memories, XXVII, 303. MIMd., 304. Digitized by Microsoft® 102 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS passion. The lower house should be elected without other re- strictions than such as applied to the British House of Com- mons. 44 Such a scheme Bolivar was destined to attempt to carry out, at least in its main features. Upon renewing the war in 1816, he was accorded dictatorial powers. Having made considerable progress toward the recovery of the country from the enemy, he called a congress which met at Angostura, afterward Ciudad Bolivar, February 8, 1819, for the purpose of restoring con- stitutional government. Into the hands of the congress, Bo- livar resigned the extraordinary authority which he had been exercising, and recommended the adoption of the constitution of which he presented a draft. In an address to the congress, he set forth more fully than he had previously done his political principles. He was of the opinion that only a democracy is susceptible of absolute liberty. " But," he asks, " what demo- cratic government has united at one time power, prosperity, and permanence? Is it not true, on the contrary, that aris- tocracy and monarchy have been the foundation of the great and powerful empires which have lasted for centuries? What government has endured longer than that of China? What republic has been more durable than that of Sparta, or that of Venice? Did not the empire of Rome conquer the earth? Has not France been a monarchy for fourteen centuries? What power is greater than England? These nations have been, nevertheless, either aristocratic or monarchical." In spite of these painful reflections, he felt great satisfac- tion in the steps taken by the republic of Venezuela. She had achieved her independence, had proscribed monarchy and priv- ilege, had set up a democratic government, had declared the rights of man. But admirable as was the constitution of Ven- ezuela, it was not suited to existing conditions. In his opin- ion it was a marvel that its model in North America had hap pily endured, without being overthrown at the first appearance « O'Leary, Memoriae, XXVII, 306. Digitized by Microsoft® FAILURE OF MONARCHICAL PLOTS 103 of difficulty or danger. The people of the United States in many respects were unique; they were models of political vir- tue ; they breathed the atmosphere of liberty ; yet it was, after all, he repeated, astonishing that a weak, complicated federal system such as theirs should have survived the trials through which it had passed. Be that as it may, he had not the remot- est intention of trying to adopt the system of a people so differ- ent from Spanish Americans as were the Anglo-Americans. Venezuela should have a constitution adapted to the political conditions of the country ; to the religion, customs, inclinations, of its inhabitants; to the degree of liberty which they were prepared to receive. This was the code they should consult, and not that of Washington. 45 The model, he insisted, should be the British constitution. The principle of federation should be abolished, the adminis- tration centralized, and the triumvirate which constituted the executive authority, under the constitution of 1811, be re- placed by a president with greatly enlarged powers. The office, though filled by election, should be analogous to that of the British sovereign. The ministers alone should be responsible. The president of a republic should be invested with even greater authority than that exercised by the chief magistrate of a mon- archy; for the throne is protected by the veneration of the people, by the loyalty of the nobility, and by the fraternal in- terest of other monarchs, whereas the president of a republic stands alone, resisting the combined attacks of opinion, inter- ests, and passions of the whole social body of the state. 40 Bo- livar did not on this occasion propose that the president be elected for life, but he warmly championed the hereditary senate. The congress, in spite of Bolivar's great prestige, was not « O'Leary, Memorias, XXVII, 499. « Ibid., 506-519. For Bolivar's address to the congress of Angostura, Feburary 15, 1819, see Elanco-Azpurua, Documentos, VI, 585-598. Digitized by Microsoft® 104 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS inclined to accept his aristocratic scheme without due consid- eration. Their deliberations continued for six months, at the end of which time the project was adopted with no important changes other than the rejection of the hereditary senate, and the elimination of the provision for a fourth power, to be known as the " censors." 4T In the meantime, having provisionally accepted the presi- dency, Bolivar continued operations against the enemy, and having met with important successes in New Granada, in the liberation of which he had been invited to cooperate, he returned to Angostura in December, 1819. In an address to the con- gress he gave an account of his campaign and, declaring that the people of New Granada were generally convinced of the de- sirability of a union of the two provinces, he urged the adop- tion of the steps necessary to effect such a union. The con- gress acceded to his wishes and, consulting the expressed desire of the people of New Granada for a political union with Venezuela, enacted a " fundamental law " on December 17, 1819, creating the republic of Colombia. As but one province of New Granada was represented in the passage of the act it was provided that a general congress should meet at Kosario de Ciicuta, on January 1, 1821, for the purpose of framing a con- stitution for the United Provinces. It was determined, how- ever, that the constitution adopted shortly before at Angostura should meanwhile remain in force and serve as a basis for the new instrument. 48 No sooner had the free provinces of New Granada heard of the step taken by the congress of Angostura than meetings were held, and formal sanction was given to the union. 49 In due time the congress met at Ciicuta and adopted a con- stitution, thus definitively effecting the union of Venezuela « The sections of Bolivar's project referring to the " Censors " or " Moral Power " may be consulted in Gil Fortoul's Hiatoria Constitutional de Ve- nezuela, I, 545-551. « CLeary, Memorias, XXVIII, 18-21. *9 Ibid., 26. Digitized by Microsoft® FAILURE OF MONARCHICAL PLOTS 105 and New Granada. The republic was divided into depart- ments, at the head of which were placed intendants directly responsible to the president. The legislative branch, contrary to Bolivar's desire, was vested with the exercise of the chief authority, except in times of invasion or of internal commo- tion, when the president was authorized to assume absolute control. Moreover the judiciary was made wholly independ- ent of the executive. Bolivar, believing as he did in the neces- sity for the centralization of authority in the chief magistrate, naturally was not pleased at the weakening of this office by the relative increase of the power and of the independence of the other branches of the government. 50 Elected president, and accepting the post reluctantly, the Liberator left the administration of the state to the vice presi- dent, and under the authority of the congress continued to lead his armies against the enemy in the south. 51 It was as a re- sult of his conquests in that quarter that he was finally to have the opportunity to give concrete expression to his political ideals in the constitution of Bolivia, 52 which was adopted by that republic in October, 1826. A brief reference to some provi- sions of that instrument will throw further light upon the Liberator's political views. The outstanding feature of the Bolivian constitution was the provision for a president to be chosen for life. Great au- thority was concentrated in his hands, and he was declared not to be responsible for his administrative acts. 53 The vice presi- 60 O'Leary, Memoriae, XXVIII, 101, 102. 5i Ibid., 107. 62 This constitution, together wtih Bolivar's address to the congress on presenting his project, is found in the Blanco-Azpurua collection of Docw- ment08, X, 341-358. 53 Article 79 of the constitution is as follows : " El Presidente de la Repiiblica es el jefe de la administration del Eatado, sin responsabilidad por los actos de dieha admvmstraci&n." Blanco-Azpurua, Documentos, X, 353. Freeman in his essay on presidential government declares that the main difference between a king and a president is that the president is distinctly responsible to the law; that he may be judged and deposed by a legal process. Historical Essays, first series, p. 379. 106 PAN-AMEEICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS dent was appointed by the president and confirmed by the legislature. This body, however, was obliged to accept one of three candidates whom the president might name. 54 The parts of the constitution relating to the executive were adopted only after long debate, and then not unanimously, as was the case with practically the whole of the rest of the project. The body of " censors," for which provision had been made in the Angostura project, was included in the Bolivian scheme, the censors forming a third house of the legislative body, and the provision was now adopted. With the exception of an article declaring Boman Catholicism to be the religion of the state, which congress inserted of its own initiative, Bolivar's draft was adopted practically as presented. In the original project nothing had been said about religion. The preparation of a constitution for Bolivia was but one phase of a great scheme which had been revolving in the mind of the Liberator for some time ; namely, the union of the states of Colombia, Peru, and Bolivia. His plan is set forth in a letter to General La Fuente written at Lima shortly before sub- mitting his draft of a constitution to the Bolivian congress. He said: " At last I have finished the constitution of Bolivia, and am commissioning my aid-de-camp, Wilson, to take it to General Sucre, who will present it to the congress of Upper Peru. I may say to you now, therefore, that this constitution is going to be the ark in which we shall be saved from the shipwreck which on all sides threatens us, and especially from a direction which you would least suspect. A few days ago Senor Pando arrived from Panama, and the picture which he paints of af- fairs in general and of the situation in Colombia in particular has excited my attention and for some days past has forced me to the most distressing meditations. You have learned, no doubt, that party spirit has divided Colombia ; that her treasury is empty ; that her laws have become oppressive ; that the num- 5* Blanco- Azpurfia, D'ocumentos, X, 352, 354. Digitized by Microsoft® FAILURE OF MONARCHICAL PLOTS 107 ber of state employees increases with the decline of the treas- ury; and finally, you must know that in Venezuela they are clamoring for an empire. This is a very brief statement of the condition of things in Colombia ; but it is sufficient to give you an idea of what I feel under the circumstances. This is not all, my dear general. The worst is that if the trend con- tinues as at present we shall in time experience the same re- sults in Peru ; and here as well as there we shall lose what we have achieved by our sacrifices. After careful consideration we have agreed — men of the best judgment and myself — that the only remedy that we can apply in this serious situa- tion is a general federation of Bolivia, Peru, and Colombia, closer than that of the United States, ruled by a president and vice president under the Bolivian constitution, which, the neces- sary changes being made, might serve for each state and the federation as well. The intention is to attain the most perfect union possible under the federal system. The government of each of the federal states will remain in the hands of a vice president and two legislative chambers. These governments will deal with questions of religion, justice, civil administra- tion, economic matters, and, in short, everything not relating to foreign affairs and war. Each department will send a deputy to the Federal Congress which will be divided into three chambers, each chamber having a third of the deputies of each republic. These three chambers with the vice presi- dents and the secretaries of state, who will be elected from the republic at large, will govern the federation. The Liberator, as supreme chief, will visit yearly the departments of each state. The capital will be a central point. Colombia should be divided into three states: Cundinarnarca, Venezuela, and Quito. The federation will take whatever name may be chosen for it. 55 There will be one flag, one army, and a single nation. It is indispensable that Peru and Bolivia should begin in some 55 It is this proposed federation that Villanueva calls El Imperio de los Andes in his book of that title. Digitized by Microsoft® 108 FAN-AMEKICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS way to put this plan into effect, since their situation makes them more dependent upon one another. Later it will be easy for me to induce Colombia to adopt the only means left for her salvation. Upper and Lower Peru united, Arequipa will be the capital of one of the three great departments into which these united states will then be divided, after the manner of the great divisions of Colombia." 56 The Sefior Pando, to whom Bolivar refers above, was Jose M. Pando, one of the representatives sent by Peru in 1825 to take part in the Congress of Panama. In June, 1825, shortly before that body finally convened, Pando was recalled by Bolivar and made Minister of Foreign Affairs of Peru. The fact that Pando upon his return began a vigorous propaganda in favor of the federation of Bolivia, Peru, and Colombia makes it not unreasonable to suppose that the Liberator, hav- ing great confidence in that statesman's ability and judgment, recalled him for the purpose of furthering the scheme. Pando brought from Panama alarming reports to the effect that the Spanish had concentrated great forces in Cuba with the inten- tion of attacking some point on the coast of Colombia, and that another expedition equally strong was being prepared in Spain for the same purpose ; that the Spanish squadron in the harbor of Havana was greatly superior to the small Colombian fleet; that Mexico intended to make a separate peace; that Prance was offering to pay the expenses of the military opera- tions of Spain; that the Holy Alliance was resolved to reduce the republics of America to obedience to the mother country, and that Great Britain, desirous of seeing the democratic foun- dations of the new states swept away, would not be opposed to the plans of the continental powers. 57 The external dangers were exaggerated, no doubt, in order to bring the people of Colombia, Peru, and Bolivia to a realiza- 56 O'Leary, Memorias, XXVIII, 507-508. 57 Ibid., 503-505. Ibid. (Bolivar to Santander, April 23, 1826), 655-658. Digitized by Microsoft® FAILURE OF MONARCHICAL PLOTS 109 tion of the necessity of organizing strong, effective governments to prevent internal disorder, as well as to repel invasion. Pando, in accordance with what appears to have heen a pre- concerted plan, urged the establishment of an empire embracing the territory from Potosi to the Orinoco. His views were shared by many others. Among this number was General Ga- marra, afterward president of the republic of Peru, who of- fered to support Bolivar in the establishment of the only sys- tem, the monarchical, which in his opinion could destroy anarchy and make independence a blessing. 58 O'Leary affirms that Bolivar never countenanced these mon- archical schemes ; that though he believed the adoption of such a system might assure for the new states the protection of Europe it would inevitably result in war between the partisans of republicanism and those of monarchy. 59 Bolivar's public utterances appear to bear out O'Leary's contention. In his letter to General La Fuente, the Liberator mentions the fact that in Venezuela they were clamoring for an empire. He had in fact received a letter from General Paez, commandant of the military forces in Venezuela, who wrote as the leader of a movement of revolt there, proposing, as Bolivar expressed it, Napoleonic ideas. 60 In a letter to Vice President Santander under date of February 21, 1826, 61 Bolivar said that in reply- ing to General Paez he would direct his attention to the draft of the constitution for Bolivia, and that he wished opinion turned in favor of this instrument, for he believed it would satisfy the most extreme views. He thought that the over- 58 La Fuente also favored the federation. Haigh gives an account I Sketches, 183) of a banquet given by La Fuente to promote good feeling between Colombia and Peru and between these and Great Britain. 59 O'Leary, Memoriae, XXVIII, 57-60. so IUd., 57, 60. General Paez declares in his autobiography that the letter referred to is not in accordance with the original and he gives what he claims is the cor- rect version. Autobiografia, I, 487-490. 61 Villanueva, El Imperio de los Andes, citing Consul Watts to Mr. Can- ning, Cartagena, May 20, 1826. Digitized by Microsoft® 110 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS confidence which led to Iturbide's downfall ought to be guarded against; or rather that the thing to be guarded against was the just suspicion on the part of the people that a new aristocracy would destroy equality. The plan for establishing an empire offended him more than all the insults of his- enemies, because it was based on the assumption that he was a man of vulgar ambition, capable of putting himself on a level with Iturbide and other such miserable usurpers. According to those who proposed such a plan nobody could be great except after the manner of Alexander, Caesar, and Napoleon. " I wish to sur- pass them all," he said, " in unselfishness, since I cannot equal them in deeds." 62 A few days later (March 6) he wrote to Paez reminding him that Colombia was not France nor he himself Napoleon, suggesting a possible solution of all difficulties through the adoption of the Bolivian constitution, and in general discoiirag- ing any effort to promote plans for the establishment of a monarchy. 63 Realizing that the open discussion of the question of mon- archy would lead to the formation of warring factions, Bolivar availed himself of the opportunity, on different occasions, to make declarations disclaiming any intention on his part to establish such a form of government. As early as September, 1823, at a banquet given him in Lima, he expressed the hope that the American people might never consent to the elevation of thrones in their territory; that as Napoleon was sent into exile and the new Emperor Iturbide driven from the throne of Mexico, so might the usurpers of the rights of the American people be dealt with. He wished to see not a single would-be sovereign triumphant in the whole extent of the New World. 64 In June, 1824, Bolivar made certain remarks to an officer, sent by Commodore Hull of the United States Navy to treat 82 O'Leary, Memorias, XXVIII, 651-653. «3lMd., 653-655. 64 Villanueva, Bolivar y el General San Martin, 279. Odriozola, Docwmentos Histdricos del Peril, V, 328. Digitized by Microsoft® FAILURE OF MONARCHICAL PLOTS 111 with him, respecting matters affecting American vessels in the Pacific, which confirm the view that he was opposed to the establishment of monarchical governments. " They say," the Liberator declared, " that I wish to found an empire in Peru or join Peru to Colombia and establish an absolute government with myself at the head of it ; but this is all false and does me great injustice. If my heart does not deceive me I shall follow in the footsteps of Washington. I would rather have an end like his than be monarch of the whole earth, and of this all those who know me are convinced. My only ambition is the glory of Colombia and the desire to see my native land assume its place in the circle of enlightened nations." 65 This was said in the presence of officers of the Patriot army. But these declarations antedated two years or more the Bo- livian constitution and the efforts to found the " Empire of the Andes." Had Bolivar changed from republican to mon- archist ? The so-called " prophetic letter " cited above and his address to the congress of Angostura show that he was early convinced that his people were not ready for democratic insti- tutions ; and that he wished to see established strongly central- ized governments with certain aristocratic tendencies. The fol- lowing extract from the report of a conference between the Liberator and Captain Mailing of the British Navy, which took place in March, 1825, serves to recall his former expressions and to raise anew the question of his republicanism. Begin- ning the conversation with a reference to the reports that had reached him from Bogota, relative to the fear of an attack by France upon Colombia, Bolivar said : " But what can France or Spain expect to gain ? They can never obtain a permanent footing in our country. France has declared .that she will not tolerate popular governments, that revolutions have distracted Europe during the last thirty years, and that America can never see peace so long as she gives way to the popular cry of equality ; and, in truth, I am of the opin- •s Blanco- Azpurfia, Dooumentos, IX, 322. Digitized by Microsoft® 112 PAN-AMEKICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS ion of France, for, although no man is a greater advocate for the rights and liberties of mankind than I, and I have proved this by devoting my fortune and the best years of my life to their attainment, still I must confess this country is not ready for government by the people, which one must allow, after all, is generally better in theory than in practice. No country is more free than England under a well-regulated monarchy. She is the envy of all the countries of the world, and the pattern all would wish to follow in forming a new constitution or gov- ernment. Of all countries South America is, perhaps, the least fitted for republican government. What does its population consist of but Indians and negroes ? — who are more ignorant than the vile race of Spaniards we are just emancipated from. A country represented and governed by such people must go to ruin. We must look to England for relief, and you have not only my leave but my request that you will communicate our conversation and bring the matter under the consideration of H.B.M. government in any manner which may seem best to you, either officially or otherwise. You may say that I never have been an enemy of monarchies, upon general principles. On the contrary, I think it essential to the respectability and well being of new nations, and if any proposal ever comes from the British Cabinet for the establishment of an orderly government — that is, of a monarchy or monarchies in the New World — they will find in me a steady and firm promoter of their views, perfectly ready to uphold the sovereign whom Eng- land may propose to place and support upon the throne. " I know it has been said of me I wish to be a king, but it is doubtful [sic'] not so. I would not accept the crown for my- self, for when I see this country made happy under a good and firm government, I shall again retire into private life. I re- peat to you if I can be of service in forwarding the wishes and views of the British Government in bringing about this de- sirable object, they may depend upon my services. " I owe it to England. I would infinitely sooner be indebted Digitized by Microsoft® FAILURE OF MONARCHICAL PLOTS 113 to England for its always generous and liberal assistance than to any other country. France or Spain would treat with me, no doubt, were I to make similar proposals to them, but never will I submit to any interference with America on the part of those odious and treacherous nations. " The title of king would perhaps not be popular at first in South America and therefore it might be as well to meet the prejudice by assuming that of Inca ee that the Indians are so much attached to. This enslaved and miserable country has hitherto only heard the name of king confiled [sic~\ with its miseries, and Spanish cruelties and a change of vice kings has invariably proved a change of one rapacious oppressor for an- other. Democracy has its charms for the people, and in theory it appears plausible to have a free government which shall exclude all hereditary distinctions, but England is again our example. " How infinitely more respectable your nation is, governed by its king, lords, and commons, than that which prides itself upon an equality which holds but little templation [sic^\ to exertion for the benefit of the state; indeed I question much whether the present state of things will continue very long in the United States. In short I wish you to be well assured I am not an enemy of kings or of aristocratical governments, provided that they be under necessary restraints, which your constitution imposes upon the three degrees. If we are to have a new government, let it be modeled on yours, and I am ready to give my support to any sovereign England may give us." 67 «8 This title was proposed in Miranda's draft of a constitution prepared in London in 1808. Gil Fortoul, Historia Constitutional de Venezuela, I, 517. 67 Rojas, Tiempo Perdido, 8-11; Villanueva, Fernando Til y los Nuevos Estados, 257-261, citing archives of the British Government. Foreign office, Peru, 1825, No. 6. Captain Mailing to Lord Melville, Ghorrillos, March 20, 1825. Eojas gives what purports to be an exact copy of the letter in the original English. His version is followed here. Apparently, however, errors have been made in transcribing and in printing the letter. Such Digitized by Microsoft® 114 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS The letter of Captain Mailing reached the Admiralty July 25, 1825, and on August 1 a copy of it was sent to Canning. No action was taken by the Foreign Office. This unusual method of carrying on diplomatic intercourse is explained by the fact that the consul-general, Thomas Eowcroft, whom the government of Great Britain had sent out to Lima in October, 1823, and through whom the correspondence ordinarily would, have been conducted, had been accidentally killed a few months before the conversation with Captain Mailing took place. That Bolivar did not employ Peruvian or Colombian agents for this particular purpose was due, in the opinion of certain Vene- zuelan writers, to his lack of faith in their loyalty ; a8 and they cite in evidence of this the fact that of his aids-de-camp in whom he most fully confided, three, O'Leary, Wilson, and Ferguson, were British, and another, Peru de la Croix, was French. That Bolivar trusted these foreigners on his- staff is true ; but it does not follow that he distrusted his own countrymen. Nor do his conversations on the subject of a monarchy necessarily disclose his real convictions. His aim may have been nothing more than to make soundings. Such, at least, seems to have been the object of his conference with the French admiral, Rosamel. At about the time of the conference with Captain Mailing, Bolivar received Rosamel, and expressed to him views substantially the same as those which he had made known to Captain Mailing. He even went so far as to manifest a de- sire to have France take the initiative in the matter of setting up monarchies in South America. On other occasions the Lib- erator expressed himself with similar freedom. 69 One example may be given. While Bolivar was an exile in Haiti in 1816, errors as were plainly typographical have been corrected in the above extract. 68 Villanueva, Fernando VII y los Nuevos Estados, 261. Bolivar, at this time, says Rojas {Tiempo Perdido 11), did not confide in any Colombian or Peruvian with the exception of General Sucre, who alone merited his full confidence. eo Villanueva, El Imperio de los Andes, 72-74. Digitized by Microsoft® FAILURE OF MONARCHICAL PLOTS 115 lie received aid in fitting out an expedition from an influential British merchant by the name of Sutherland. Bolivar held Sutheiland in high esteem, and it appears spoke freely to him on the subject of government in the new states. 70 The British merchant related his impressions afterward to his son, Robert Sutherland, who, as British consul at Maracaibo, wrote Canning on July 5, 1824, as follows: " I must observe to you that it was all along Bolivar's inten- tion to change the form of government, as he had expressed such an intention to the late Mr. Sutherland, his most cordial friend. ... In another conversation with Mr. Sutherland Bolivar re- marked that he was aware that a republican form of govern- ment was not suited to the genius of the Colombians, but that he felt it necessary to cry it up to aid the revolution and to attribute to Ferdinand all the despotic acts of the former sys- tem, but when I get rid of the Spaniards and you visit me I shall have you kneeling and kissing my hands. This was said in a jocular way. These are anecdotes which I believe are alone known to me." 71 Do Bolivar's confidences to foreigners and his political philosophy as expressed, particularly in his Angostura address and in his Bolivian constitution, justify the conclusion that he was at heart a monarchist ? Were the opinions which he ex- pressed to foreigners, especially to representatives of Great Britain and France, his real political convictions? Were the frequent declarations which he made to his fellow countrymen of loyalty to the principles of popular representative govern- ment mere political strategy ? And finally, was the real pur- pose of his Bolivian constitution to serve as an easy means of transition from the already established republican institutions and democratic tendencies to an aristocratic monarchical sys- tem, frankly avowed? A brief review of the Liberator's po- 'o Villanueva, Fernando VII y lot Nuevos Estados, 250. El Imperio de los Andes, 97-108; 285. 7i Villanueva, Bolivar y el General San Martin, 278; citing British ar- chives, Foreign office. O'Leary, Memorias, XXVII, 340. , Digitized by Microsoft® 116 PAN-AMEEICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS litical activity during the four succeeding years, up to his death in 1830, will help to answer these questions. At about the time Bolivar presented his draft of a constitu- tion to the congress of Bolivia, the situation in Colombia had really become acute. An insurrection in Venezuela had re- sulted in the virtual separation of that province from the republic. General Paez had been proclaimed civil and mili- tary chief and empowered to continue in office as long as cir- cumstances might demand, or until the return of Bolivar, whose authority as president there was no intention of disputing. 72 The spirit of rebellion soon spread to the south. On July 19, 1826, the municipality of Quito in secret session passed reso- lutions urging the Liberator to perpetuate himself in the office of chief executive with the title of life president, or with what- ever other title he might find most suitable. 73 After several months of agitation the citizens and members of the local gov- ernment of Guayaquil met, on August 28, and " reassumed " their sovereignty to resign it forthwith to Bolivar, " the father of the country." This assembly declared that the Liberator should have absolute control of the destinies of the nation until he had rescued it from the impending ruin ; and that until the system of government should be definitely determined the Bo- livian constitution should prevail. 74 On September 6, the au- thorities and citizens of Quito in public assembly adhered to the action taken at Guayaquil. 75 Moved by these reports from the north, encouraged by the leaders of the rebellious factions to believe that his presence there was indispensable, and convinced that the moment had arrived for giving concrete form to his project of federating Colombia, Peru, and Bolivia, the Liberator resolved to quit Peru and return to Colombia. The announcement of his in- 72 For a full account of this insurrection see O'Leary, Memorias, XXVIII, 603-640. 73 O'Leary, Memorias, II, 644-645. 7* Odriozola, Documentos Eistdricos del PerA, VII, 151-154 75 Ibid., VII, 155. Digitized by Microsoft® FAILURE OF MONARCHICAL PLOTS 117 tention was the cause of anxiety in Peru; for no satisfactory governmental machinery had been organized. Bolivar's rule had been that of a beneficent despot. It was feared, therefore, that on his departure the country would fall into a state of anarchy similar to that with which it had been afflicted prior to his coming. Every effort accordingly was made to induce him to remain in Peru. Memorials of citizens and of civic and ecclesiastical corporations poured in from every part of the republic, beseeching him not to abandon the country. And finally, as a last resort, the electoral colleges were convoked and the Bolivian constitution was submitted to them for approval. They voted almost unanimously in favor of its adoption and designated at the same time the Liberator as life president. These measures, however, did not have the desired effect, for on September 4, having delegated the authority which he had been exercising as Dictator to the grand marshal, Santa Cruz, Bolivar embarked for Guayaquil. 76 The Bolivian constitution, it may be said in passing, was proclaimed in Peru on December 9, 1826. Its life was short. On January 26, 1827, the Colombian troops still in Peru re- volted, declaring against the constitution. It was charged that Vice President Santander of Colombia had fomented the re- bellion in order to check Bolivar's imperial designs and to safe- guard the Colombian constitution which was then threatened. On January 27 the government of Peru resolved to put into force the Peruvian constitution of 1823; and a congress was convoked to meet on May 1 for the purpose of electing a presi- dent and vice president. Bolivar had foreseen the breakdown of his system in Peru ; for, writing to Santa Cruz in October, while on his way to Bogota, he predicted the nationalistic reac- tion and counseled his friends not to oppose it, not to support his " American plans " as against purely Peruvian aims. 77 When Bolivar reached Guayaquil toward the middle of Sep- ia O'Leary, Memoriae, XXVIII, 526-527. 77 Vargas, Bistoria del Peril Independiente, III, 185, 233, 240-245. Digitized by Microsoft® 118 PAN-AMEKICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS tember, 1826, lie learned of the revolutionary movement which had shortly before taken place in that department. In view of the reports which had for some time past been reaching him, respecting the state of affairs in Colombia, he was doubtless not surprised at what had occurred, nor was he disposed to con- demn the acts of rebellion. On the contrary, his mild reproof of the insurrectionists and his promotion of the intendant, Mosquera, who had lent his support to the uprising, warrant the suspicion that the Liberator might have regarded with satis- faction the movement to overthrow the established order. His procedure shortly afterward at Quito, where he granted amnesty to those who had renounced the constitution, gives further ground for the suspicion. 78 Before he had been long in the republic it became clear that his powerful influence was not to be exerted toward the restoration of the constitution of 1821. That instrument had never met with his hearty acquiescence and it now stood in the way of the realization of his political plans. By its own provisions it could not be legally super- seded until after a period of ten years from the time of its adoption. The empire of the Andes could not wait. Bolivia and Peru had just adopted the Bolivian constitution. Colom- bia must find the means to do likewise and the union of the three republics must at once be accomplished. Otherwise, the golden opportunity for the establishment of a great South Amer- ican state would be forever lost. Bolivar arrived at Bogota in November. Assuming the of- fice of president to which he had been reelected the year before, he immediately suspended the constitutional guarantees, in ac- cordance with a provision of the constitution granting the chief executive that authority in times of extraordinary danger and at the same time issued a proclamation to the Colombian people declaring that he had returned anxious to comply with the will of the nation. He added, however, that he had taken upon him- self with repugnance the exercise of the supreme power be- 78 O'Leary, Memoriae, XXVIII, 671-674; Ibid., XXIV, 432-434. Digitized by Microsoft® FAILURE OF MONARCHICAL PLOTS 119 cause by so doing he laid himself open to the charge of being ambitious and of desiring to establish a monarchy. " What," he exclaimed, " am I believed to be so insensate as to desire to descend? Is not the destiny of Liberator more sublime than the throne ? " 79 Nevertheless he continued to exercise dic- tatorial authority. Instead of taking steps to compel the re- bellious departments in the south to render obedience to the fundamental law, he permitted them to maintain an anomalous status with responsibility to himself alone. A little later he made a similar arrangement with Paez in Venezuela; and as other sections of the republic had repudiated the constitution while protesting allegiance to Bolivar personally, the situation appeared to favor the execution of his plans. Accordingly, at the instance of Bolivar, the Colombian con- gress, in August, 1827, convoked an assembly to meet at Ocana, early the next year, ostensibly to revise the constitution of 1821, but really to adopt the Bolivian constitution. For some months past, opposition to the Liberator's plans had been gaining ground under the leadership of Vice President Santander, and when the convention assembled it was discovered that the partisans of Bolivar were in the minority. By skillfully appealing to the sentiment of respect for the law, and by taking a stand in favor of the growing demand for the adoption of the federal system in Colombia, Santander had been able to attract to his standard a sufficient number of followers to defeat the ends of the oppos- ing party. Finding that they were outnumbered, Bolivar's partisans withdrew from the convention, and as this left it without a quorum, the attempt to revise the constitution was abandoned. 80 As soon as this was known at Bogota, the public authorities and a number of the citizens of the capital assembled and " O'Leary, Memorias, XXIV, 512. so Gil Fortoul, Historia Constitutional de Venezuela, I, 423-433. For a full account of this attempt at constitutional reform see a work by JosS Joaquin Guerra entitled La Gonvencidn de Ocana. Digitized by Microsoft® 120 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS adopted a resolution requesting the Liberator to assume full authority and to continue to exercise it until he should deem it convenient to convoke a national assembly. The example of Bogota was followed in time by a number of municipalities in other parts of the republic. But Bolivar did not wait for a further expression of the popular will. In June, 1828, he re- turned to Bogota — he had been spending the past few months at Bucaramanga — and resumed the chief magistracy, virtually as dictator. Three months later his enemies made an unsuc- cessful attempt to dislodge him from power by force of arms, and this led him to cast aside the few remaining constitutional restraints in order that he might employ the most stringent means to maintain order and prevent the dissolution of the re- public. 81 Foreign complications no less than domestic troubles now demanded the attention of the Liberator. Late in 1828 hos- tilities broke out with Peru, and, taking the field to direct opera- tions against the enemy who had invaded the southern depart- ments, Bolivar remained in the South until the autumn of 1829, when, peace having been restored, he returned to the capital. During his absence he continued, in spite of his pre- occupation with military matters, to give to the question of the political organization of the state all the attention the circum- stances would permit. He was particularly anxious on the one hand to lay the rumors which were being spread abroad by his enemies, charging him with plotting the establishment of a monarchy, and on the other to keep before the minds of the people the fact that they themselves were to determine the fate of the republic through their representatives soon to be con- vened in a new assembly. 82 But as time passed he despaired of effecting without foreign assistance the political stability which he so ardently desired for Colombia and for the other countries to whose emancipation he had so largely contributed. si Gil Fortoul, Hi&toria Constitutional de Venezuela, I, 434—436. 82 Bolivar to Vergara, Dee. 16, 1828. O'Leary, Memorias, XXXI, 264. Digitized by Microsoft® FAILURE OF MONARCHICAL PLOTS 121 In April, 1829, Bolivar wrote from Quito to the Minister of Foreign Relations at Bogota recommending that he speak in a confidential manner with the diplomatic representatives of the United States and Great Britain respecting the state of anarchy into which the South American countries would likely fall unless some great Power should intervene in their af- fairs. A few months later his Secretary, who accompanied him in the South and who doubtless faithfully expressed the views of his chief, put the matter more insistently. " How is America," he wrote, " to be freed from the anarchy which is consuming it and from the European colonization which threat- ens it? There was convened an Amphictyonic Congress (that of Panama)," he continued, " and its work was disdained by the nations most interested in its decisions. There was proposed a partial federation of three sovereign states and maledictions and scandal were raised to the skies. In short, America needs a regulator. . . . His Excellency has not the remotest personal interest in this matter further than that of Colombia and of America. He adheres not to the word but to the thing. Call it what you will, if only the result corre- sponds with his desire that America be placed under the cus- tody, protection, mediation or influence of one or more power- ful states, who shall preserve it from the destruction to which it is being led by systematic anarchy and from the colonial regimen by which it is threatened. Did not England offer spon- taneously her mediation between Brazil and Bio de la Plata? Did she not intervene by arms between Turkey and Greece? Let us seek therefore, Sir, something to which to cling, or re- sign ourselves to sink beneath the flood of evils which rise to overwhelm unhappy America." 8S The Council of Ministers, upon whom the duties of govern- ment devolved in Bolivar's absence, took this note under con- sideration on September 3, 1829, and, convinced that the Lib- erator's idea could not be carried into execution until there 8 s Gil Fortoul, Historia Constitutional de Venezuela, I, 459, Digitized by Microsoft® 122 PAN-AMEKICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS should be in Colombia a "stable government," directed the Minister of Foreign Kelations to open negotiations with the diplomatic representatives of England and France in accord- ance with instructions which were substantially as follows : 1. It should be made clear why Colombia found it necessary to change its form of government from a republic to a consti- tutional monarchy. Although the nation had the indisputable right of adopting the form of government which it deemed most appropriate, yet in order to act in harmony with his Britannic Majesty and his Most Christian Majesty, the Council of Min- isters desired to know whether those governments, in the event the congress should agree to establish a constitutional mon- archy, would give their assent to it. 2. In case assent were obtained, it was the opinion of the Council of Ministers that Bolivar should rule for the rest of his life, using the title of Liberator, and that the title of king or emperor should not be employed until his successor should come into power. 3. Inquiry should be made as to whether Colombia would be left free to designate the Liberator and such prince, house, or dynasty to succeed him as the interests of the country might demand. 4. Finally, the importance of the steps which Colombia con- templated with a view to its own political organization and that of the rest of America should be made clear to the representa- tives of Great Britain and France. But as it was probable that the United States and the other American republics would become alarmed at the action of Colombia, the effective and powerful intervention of England and France should be sought to the end that Colombia be not disturbed in the exercise of her right to adopt the form of government that she might find most acceptable. It should be made clear to France, though without entering into any engagement on the subject, that in the event some branch of the royal families of Europe should be selected, Colombia would prefer a prince of the house of Digitized by Microsoft® FAILURE OF MONARCHICAL PLOTS 123 France, for he would have the same religion as that which prevailed in Colombia, and for other reasons of a political na- ture would be most acceptable to the Colombian people. 84 The Colombian Minister of Foreign Affairs complied with the instructions, and without delay the project was brought to the attention of the governments of Great Britain and France. But the plan was not well received. France did not wish to take any steps which might make it appear that she opposed the reestablishment of Spanish power in the Western Hemisphere. England was no less opposed to the scheme in so far as it in- volved the royal families of Great Britain and of France. In a dispatch dated December 16, 1829, the minister of Colombia in London gave the verbal reply of Lord Aberdeen to the pro- posal. " The government of his Majesty," said Lord Aber- deen, " far from opposing the establishment in Colombia of a government similar to that of this country, would be very glad to see such a reform effected, for they are convinced that it would contribute to the order and therefore to the prosperity of that part of America; but the British Government would not permit a prince of the French house to cross the Atlantic to be crowned in the New World. . . . And in order that you may be convinced that there is no inconsistency or ulterior motive on our part, I declare also that the government of his Majesty could not allow a prince of the royal family to rule in any part of Spanish America, if this were proposed." 85 This attitude of the British cabinet is confirmed in a dispatch, dated February 20, 1830, from the Spanish minister at Lon- don to his government. Lord Aberdeen, he said, had told him confidentially that the existing government of the so-called republic of Colombia had lately sent an official communication to the British Government, indicating that the pretended Lib- erator, Simon Bolivar, who was soon to be given supreme au- thority for life with the title of president, dictator, king, em- 8 *Gil Fortoul, Historia Constitutional de Venezuela, I, 460. 85 Ibid., I, 465. Digitized by Microsoft® 124 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS peror, or other such title, and to be vested with the power to appoint his successor, proposed to England that the succession be allowed to fall upon a prince of the reigning family ; or if this were not agreeable, that no opposition be made to the elec- tion of a prince of some other royal family of Europe. Lord Aberdeen declared, furthermore, that while opposing the estab- lishment of a member of any of the reigning families of Europe, with the exception of that of Spain, upon the throne of Bogota, there was no objection to Colombia's placing the supreme au- thority of the state in the hands of one of its own citizens un- der the form of government which might be deemed most suit- able. But the whole plan seemed to Lord Aberdeen imprac- ticable, and the Spanish minister was given to understand that the British Government would not encourage it in any form. 88 Bolivar did not approve the step taken by the Council of Ministers. Late in the autumn, while on his way to the capi- tal he directed after " mature reflection " his Secretary, Espi- nar, to write the Minister of Foreign- Relations at Bogota re- questing that " every proceeding tending to forward the pending negotiation with the governments of France and England " be suspended in view of the " resolution of his excellency to in- vite the nation to freely express its preference respecting the political system which should be established." 87 Years after- ward Vergara, the Minister of Foreign Relations, declared that the whole responsibility belonged to the Council of Ministers, 88 and that the Liberator was in no wise to be blamed unless it were for his delay in officially disapproving a project which was repugnant to his sentiments. Thus by the close of 1829 monarchical plotting in Colombia had come to an end. Some months later however a dying echo of the Colombian plots was heard in Peru. It appears that during the monih of April, 1830, there were circulated in Lima copies of alleged s« IUd., I, 467. 87 Posada Gutierrez, Memorias hist6rico-poUticas, I, 211. 88 Monsalve, El ideal politico del Lioertador Simdn, BoUvar, 391. Digitized by Microsoft® FAILURE OF MONARCHICAL PLOTS 125 instructions given by Bolivar to Mosquera, the Colombian minister to Peru. 89 These instructions were said to have been sent to the Peruvian capital by General Demarquet, one of Bolivar's aids-de-camp, who, through failure to observe due precaution, allowed copies of them to be made. The sup- posed instructions were thus secretly passed from hand to hand in Peru; and in Chile, where they were sent, extracts of them were published. A manuscript copy was obtained by the United States minister, Larned, at Lima and sent by him to the Secretary of State at Washington. 90 On June 30, El Conciliador, a government organ published at Lima, gave a summary of the instructions but maintained with well grounded reasons that they were apocryphal. The instructions were in substance as follows : " The em- pire will be realized or rivers of blood will flow in America; therefore, I charge you to act with energy and constancy. What have you to fear from those impotent Peruvians ? Have you not already obtained the assent of Gamarra and of La Fuente ? 91 Are not our friends in control of the cabinet ? . . . Are they not protected by our warships and by our power? Leave the Uanero, Paez, and these doctors of Bogota to me. If you do your work well there, I will answer for the outcome ; not, it is true, as soon as I should like. In the mean- time let the government of Peru destroy the liberals on the pre- text of anarchy. . . . Lead Gamarra on by telling him that he will have the best dukedom, the richest, the most civilized, and the most extensive, for it will stretch from the Santa to the Apurimac. There could not be a better division. Tell La Fuente, confidentially, the same thing with reference to his dukedom which will embrace the territory between the Apuri- mac and the Desaguadero; and maintain continual jealousies between them and Elespuru. 89 Odriozola, Documentos Histdrioos del Perti, X, 130. »o Larned to Van Buren, June 24, 1830, No. 25: MSS. State Department w President and vice president respectively. Digitized by Microsoft® 126 PAN-AMEBICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS " Proceed in the fullest harmony with General Santa Cruz, 92 and when you note that he is becoming uneasy about his fate, because of what he may learn from talebearers, inform him that I intend to give the dukedom of Bolivia to Sucre, and that he may rely on my word of honor to award him the dukedom of Lima, by which means I shall punish Gamarra for his past un- faithfulness. Much care with O'Higgins. 93 Have him main- tain discord in Chile so that I may be compelled finally to in- tervene in that country in his behalf with the forces of Peru. Do not extend your activities to Buenos Aires, for I have my spies and agents there. . . . See that the squadron is well sup- plied. Let it be your principal care to disarm the Peruvian forces, whether they be civil, veteran, or naval. . . . You un- derstand the necessity for putting men devoted to me in the public offices ; so you must intervene in the government in their behalf. " I do not need to warn you to prevent those who are not good Colombians from getting into positions of influence with Gamarra and La Fuente ; for they might bring these function- aries to realize their political situation; and in truth, if the cabinet should suffer a change in views or there should occur a change of government, everything would be lost. And what then would be our lot ? . . . Let it always be understood that I am already old and worn out, and that I shall not, accord- ingly, live to see my plans put into effect ; that I am not pro- moting the scheme for selfish motives but for the consolidation of America; that on this supposition the most worthy of the dukes of the empire will succeed me." 94 Bolivar was now ill and discouraged. The constituent as- sembly which he had summoned met in January, 1830, and attempted to forestall the rapidly approaching dissolution of the republic. But all efforts proved to be useless. With- 82 President of Bolivia. 93 O'Higgins was still an exile in Peru. 9*Larned to Van Buren, June 24, 1830, No. 25, MSS. State Department. Digitized by Microsoft® FAILURE OF MONARCHICAL PLOTS 127 out further delay Venezuela seceded from the union, and the departments of the central and southern portions of the re- public were ready to establish independent states as soon as Bolivar should relinquish the supreme authority. This he did in March. The congress made one more ineffectual effort to conciliate the disaffected departments and then the end quickly came. In May, Bolivar left Bogota for the coast with the in- tention of embarking for Europe, where he hoped to spend his remaining days in peace. This aim was unfortunately not to be realized. Persuaded by his friends to await the outcome of their last efforts to maintain the unity of the Colombian repub- lic, 95 the Liberator's health continued to decline. In a procla- mation which he addressed to the Colombian people shortly before his death, he declared that he aspired to no other glory than the unity of Colombia ; and that if his death might con- tribute to the cessation of party strife and to the consolidation of the union he would descend in peace to the grave. On De- cember 17, 1830, he died, under the roof of a Spaniard to whose villa near Santa Marta he had retired a few days before in the hope that the air of the country would restore his waning strength. Viewing Bolivar's political career as a whole, taking into consideration his public acts and utterances as well as his secret dealings with Great Britain and France, it seems futile to try to determine whether or not he was at heart monarchist or re- publican. Of his Americanism there is no doubt. His great aim was to organize into a strongly centralized and effective government the vast territory which he had liberated. He would have preferred to accomplish this under the Bolivian constitution with himself as life president. Failing that he would have accepted possibly, in order to save his country from ruin, a monarchy under British protection with a British or French prince on the throne. But he insisted always upon the severing absolutely of all political connections with Spain, and » 5 Gil Fortoul, Historic/, Constitutional de Venezuela, I, 496. Digitized by Microsoft® 128 PAN-AMEEICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS he never, even in his moments of greatest discouragement, con- templated submission to the Holy Alliance. He believed the protection of Great Britain to be essential to the independence of the new states and his manifest willingness to accept British cooperation in the establishment of stable governments was con- sistent with that belief. To his national aims and to his conception of the international situation he was loyal rather than to any less clearly defined and less fundamental principle of interior governmental organization. In conclusion a word must be said as to the attitude of the United States toward the question of monarchy. Although the general sentiment of the country naturally favored the estab- lishment of republican institutions throughout the continent, yet the government at Washington, in accordance with the national policy of nonintervention and neutrality, refrained from all interference. Though the mission which was sent to Buenos Aires in 1818 arrived there at a time when monarchistic plotting was at its height, the commissioners, however much their personal predilections might have prompted them to in- termeddle, limited themselves to the most formal expressions in behalf of the republican system. Later, when recognition was extended to some of the new states, the question of independence alone was considered — monarchies and republics alike being recognized. The minister of the empire of Mexico was received in 1822 and some two years later the Brazilian monarchy was recognized. When recognition of the latter was under consid- eration in the cabinet, some interesting discussion took place. Wirt thought that immediate recognition of Brazil would be represented as favoring the Holy Alliance and monarchies gen- erally ; and alluded to General Jackson's refusal of the mission to Mexico when Iturbide was emperor, and to his assigning, as his reason for the refusal, that he would give no counsel to that usurpation. Calhoun maintained that the established policy of the country in relation to the new states had been to look only to the question of independence and invariably to recognize the Digitized by Microsoft® FAILURE OF MONARCHICAL PLOTS 129 government de facto; that to decline to recognize the empire of Brazil because it was monarchical would be a departure from the policy hitherto observed and would introduce a new prin- ciple of interference in the internal government of foreign na- tions. 96 This, of course, was the view that prevailed. Afterward, during the administration of J. Q. Adams, it appears that the monarchical schemes in some parts of Spanish America, rumors of which reached Washington, gave the gov- ernment so much concern that it came near to departing from the policy of non-interference. This was especially true in the case of the alleged monarchical designs of Bolivar. Secretary of State Clay, once his profound admirer, wrote the Liberator adjuring him not to abandon the cause of liberty. In Novem- ber, 1827, Bolivar had taken advantage of the departure of Colonel Watts, charge d'affaires of the United States at Bogota, to send Clay a polite letter, expressing admiration for the secre- tary's " brilliant talents and ardent love of liberty " and grati- tude for the " incomparable services " which he had rendered the cause of the Patriots. Nearly a year later Clay replied in a not too cordial manner. " I am persuaded," he said, " that I do not misinterpret the feelings of the people of the United States, as I certainly express my own, in saying that the in- terest which was inspired in this country by the- arduous strug- gles of South America, arose principally from the hope that, along with its independence, would be established free institu- tions, insuring all the blessings of civil liberty. To the accom- plishment of that object we still anxiously look." Continuing, Clay admitted the difficulties which opposed the achievement of this end, but notwithstanding those difficulties the people of the United States, he said, cherished the hope that Providence would bless South America, as he had her northern sister, with the genius of some great and virtuous man, to conduct her se- curely through all her trials. "We had even flattered our- selves," he said, " that we beheld that genius in your Excel- as Adams, Memoirs, VI, 281. Digitized by Microsoft® 130 PAN-AMEKICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS lency. But I should be unworthy of the consideration with which your Excellency honors me and deviate from the frank- ness which I have ever endeavored to practice, if I did not on this occasion state that ambiguous designs have been attributed by your enemies to your Excellency, which have created in my mind great solicitude." Declaring that he could not allow himself to believe that Bolivar would abandon the " bright and glorious path " for the " bloody road passing over the liberties of the human race," Clay continued as follows: "I will not doubt that your Excellency will, in due time, render a satisfactory explanation to Colombia and the world of the parts of your public conduct which have excited any distrust; and that preferring the true glory of our immortal Washington to the ignoble fame of the destroyers of liberty, you have formed the patriotic resolution of ultimately placing the freedom of Colombia upon a firm and sure foundation." 9T About the time Clay's letter was dispatched to Bolivar, Wil- liam Henry Harrison started on what proved to be an ill-fated mission to Colombia. The story of Harrison's brief diplomatic experience in Colombia has only recently been fully related, in a study by a Venezuelan writer. 98 It constitutes an interest- ing episode in the foreign relations of America, involving as it does the Liberator of half a continent and a future President of the United States. Harrison's " thirst for lucrative office," according to Adams, was " absolutely rabid." He had been " as hot in pursuit " of the office of vice president, major gen- eral of the army, and minister to Colombia " as a hound on the scent of a hare." Adams was opposed to sending Harrison on a diplomatic mission to Colombia, but at last acquiesced, as all the other members of the administration favored his appoint- ment. The next year the Adams administration went out of office, and complaints having been made by Colombia against Harrison, he was promptly recalled by the new administration. 97 Colton, The Works of Henry Clay, I, 267. 98 Rivas, A. C, Enaayos de Historic Politico, y Diplomdtica. Digitized by Microsoft® FAILURE OF MONARCHICAL PLOTS 131 On the occasion of a visit of the returned minister, Adams re- corded in his journal a succinct account of what had happened. After reviewing the political situation in Colombia at the time Harrison arrived there, Adams declared : " He soon found himself an object of jealous observation. Inattentive to the admonitions of time and place, he indulged himself in pane- gyrics upon the freedom of speech and action enjoyed in the United States. He was immediately marked as an enemy of the government of Bolivar. From that moment every step he took was watched, every word he said was caught, scrutinized, and perverted. He was made accountable for the loose talk of his son and of his secretary of legation, and soon signalized as a conspirator against the Liberator. He visited the British consul, and they were both charged with plotting projects of assassination. He dined with a friend, and that friend was cast into a dungeon. His own life was not safe, and he was at last fortunate in getting safe out of the country." After he had taken leave of the Colombian Government Harrison wrote a letter to Bolivar to dissuade him from making himself king or dictator. This letter, Harrison published, upon his re- turn in 1830 to the United States, in a pamphlet which was intended to justify his conduct in Colombia. Moreover, Clay's instructions to the representatives of the United States to the congress at Tacubaya, in which the " ambitious projects and views " of Bolivar were referred to, were made public at the close of the Adams administration. All these things taken together must have greatly exasperated Bolivar. It was re- ported, indeed, that he had written Lord Aberdeen complaining that the greatest obstacle to the settlement of affairs in Colombia was the government of the United States. " But," Adams la- conically remarks, " I doubt this." " Harrison was succeeded as minister to Colombia by Thomas Patrick Moore. In the summer of 1829 he was instructed by Van Buren, the new Secretary of State, to place the matter of as Adams, Memoirs, VIII, 211. Digitized by Microsoft® 132 PAN-AMEKJCANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS the Tacubaya instructions, which had just been made public, before the Colombian Government on its true ground. It was the undoubted right of the late President, said Van Buren, to form such opinions as to the conduct and views of the public functionaries of other countries as he might deem just, and to give them such publicity as might comport with his views of propriety; but the disposition of the Colombian Government toward the United States " should not take its character from sentiments which have been expressed by those whom the peo- ple of these states, in the exercise of their sovereign power, have divested of executive authority." 10 ° Continuing, he declared that events in Colombia had undoubtedly produced in the minds of the friends of liberty occasional and painful appre- hensions as to the ultimate views of President Bolivar. In the opinion of the administration, however, "he ought to be con- sidered responsible to the cause of free and liberal principles only for the honest and faithful application of the means placed under his control, and a liberal allowance should be made for the difficulties incident to all attempts to convert long oppressed subjects into discreet depositories of sovereign power. The application of a different rule," continue the instructions, " would be to make President Bolivar answerable for the op- pressions which have been for a succession of years heaped upon his countrymen, and to the removal of which the best portion of his life has been devoted." 101 These instructions, together with Moore's discreet conduct, resulted in restoring the customary cordiality between the two countries. In dispatches to the De- partment of State during the summer of 1829, the new minis- ter succeeded in removing much of the suspicion which had arisen as to Bolivar's designs. Toward the end of the year, Van Buren wrote again to Moore saying that he had read his 100 In 1832, Van Buren having been appointed minister to England and having arrived at his post, learned that his nomination had been rejected by the Senate, partly on the ground that he had criticized and extenuated the acts of a previous administration. Moore, Digest Int, Law VII, 787. ioi Moore, Digest Int. Law, VII, 788. Digitized by Microsoft® FAILURE OF MONARCHICAL PLOTS 133 observations with profound interest and satisfaction. " It would be superfluous," be said, " to repeat wbat was said to you in general instructions as to the policy of this government re- specting intervention in the domestic affairs of other countries. You are well informed as to this point and as to the President's determination to demand of our public agents abroad the most scrupulous obedience to those instructions." 102 102 Van Buren to Moore, December 12, 1829. O'Leary, M emorias, XII, 420. Digitized by Microsoft® CHAPTER IV UNITED STATES AND HISPANIC' AMEBICAN INDEPENDENCE The relation of the United States to the Hispanic American struggle for independence is often made a matter of contro- versy. An illustration of the sort of discussion to which the subject gives rise appeared some years ago in the North Amer- ican Review. Matias Romero, then Mexican minister at Wash- ington, opened the debate with a paper in which he maintained that " the United States Government did not render either ma- terial or moral assistance to the cause of the independence of the Spanish American colonies." Among other things he ad- duced in support of his contention certain statements in Lyman's Diplomacy of the United States affirming that the patriot cause did not awaken any great general interest in the citizens of the United States; that the government was left free and unem- barrassed to pursue its steady course of good faith and exact neutrality toward Spain and of justice and policy toward the colonies; that neither the vicinity of some portions of their respective territories, nor the circumstance of being members of the same continent, nor the benefit to be derived from com- mercial relations, nor the similarity of their struggles for inde- pendence, appears in the least to have influenced the definite arrangements of the government ; that on the contrary the au- thorities at Washington conducted the business with the utmost caution and circumspection, doing nothing to give offense to Spain, or to awaken in other nations the slightest suspicion of their loyalty to the system of neutrality. 1 In a subsequent article Senator Money of Mississippi took the other side of the question. He declared that the view ex- i The North American Review, CLXV, 70-86 (July, 1897). 134 Digitized by Microsoft® THE UNITED STATES AND INDEPENDENCE 135 pressed in Romero's paper " leaves a disagreeable impression on the mind of the American citizen, who has always gloried in the belief that his government had cordially sympathized with any people anywhere in their struggle for liberty, and especially with those of this continent." He maintained that in permit- ting the revolutionists to buy in our cities all kinds of supplies not contraband of war; that in expressing interest and sym- pathy for them in Congress, in the public press, and through other channels of publicity; that in recognizing them before other nations had done so ; and that in arresting the movement designed by the Holy Alliance to reduce them again to subjec- tion to Ferdinand, the government and people of the United States undoubtedly rendered their cause both material and moral assistance. 2 The discussion, as may be readily perceived, hinges upon the definition of the terms " material and moral assistance." The disputants did not reach an accord on this point. , Had "ma- terial assistance " been defined as substantial military and naval support such as that given by France to the Thirteen Colonies, this phase of the question would have been eliminated at once ; for the United States formed no alliance with the Spanish pos- sessions against the mother country. Had it been defined as such support given in violation of professed neutrality, then the problem would have been to determine its extent and im- portance; that is, whether or not it were material in the sense of affecting the outcome of the struggle. It is evident that assistance afforded by supplies, openly purchased in the mar- kets of the United States and equally accessible to both parties to the contest need not be considered. Had " moral assistance " been defined as encouragement derived from the example and from the interest and sympathy of a neighboring people; the advantages flowing from the recognition of belligerency and of independence ; in short, as every aid or support not originating in the violation of or departure from neutrality, then this phase 2 Hid., 356-363 (September, 1897). Digitized by Microsoft® 136 PAN-AMEKICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS of the subject would have been greatly simplified. It would have become a matter of weighing the effect of certain undis- puted facts upon the fortunes of the insurgent cause. If the writers in the North American Review had placed some such limitation on the discussion, they would have arrived, doubtless, at substantial agreement. But in their case the fail- ure to agree was due in part to another cause; namely, the confusion of government and people. Bomero's proposition referred to the government of the United States. Money speaks of the government and people, or of one or the other, indiffer- ently. This divergence of view on the part of men exception- ally well qualified to analyze the subject and to draw just con- clusions from it but demonstrates the necessity for a careful review of the whole matter. Such is the purpose of the present chapter. As to whether, or to what extent, the patriots de- rived material or moral assistance from their relations with the United States the reader may be safely left to draw bis own conclusions. The United States maintained a neutral policy in the con- flict between Spain and her colonies. This was in harmony with an already well-established tradition. At the beginning of its independent existence, the nation adopted a distinctive foreign policy, the first and foremost principle of which was nonintervention. By this was meant not only noninterference in the internal affairs of other nations, but also nonparticipation in the political arrangements between other governments and especially those of Europe. The system of neutrality was a logical derivative of this principle. The first occasion for its application was the war which _ broke out in 1793 between France on one side and Great Britain and her European allies on the other. In his famous proclamation, issued on April 22, 1793, Washington declared that " the duty and interest of the United States require that they should with sincerity and good faith adopt and pursue a conduct friendly and impartial toward Digitized by Microsoft® THE UNITED STATES AND INDEPENDENCE 1»7 the belligerent powers." Warning the citizens against " aiding or abetting hostilities against any of the said powers," he made known to them that prosecutions would be instituted against all persons violating the law of nations with respect to the powers at war. At about the time this proclamation was issued the French minister, Genet, arrived in the United States and began fitting out and commissioning privateers and inciting the people to hostility to Great Britain. As is well known, this conduct led to his recall. In the correspondence growing out of the inci- dent, Jefferson, 'as Secretary of State, set forth with clearness and force the principles of neutrality. Its bases he found in the exclusive sovereignty of the nation within its own territory and in the obligation of impartiality toward belligerents. 3 Not only did the administration enunciate principles, but it adopted measures to make them effective. To assist the judgment of officers on this head, Hamilton prepared a set of " Instructions to the Collectors of the Customs " which he directed to " be executed with the greatest vigilance, care, activity, and impar- tiality." 4 And on June 5, 1794, these principles and rules were embodied in the first neutrality law ever enacted by any nation. This act " forbade within the United States the accept- ance and exercise of commissions, the enlistment of men, the fitting out and arming of vessels, and the setting on foot of military expeditions in the service of any prince or state with which the government was at peace." 5 The law was limited in duration to two years, but was later reenacted with some changes and continued in force indefinitely. 6 Having brought the nation safely through these first years of trial, Washington gave the policy of nonintervention and neutrality a sort of sanctity for succeeding generations of American statesmen by the following words of counsel in his farewell address : 3 Moore, The Principles of American Diplomacy, 45. 4 Hamilton, J. C, Works of Alexander Hamilton, III, 576. 5 Moore, The Principles of American Diplomacy, 46. o Bemis, American Neutrality, 52. Digitized by Microsoft® 138 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS " The great rule of conduct for us, in regard to foreign na- tions," he said, " is, in extending our commercial relations, to have with them as little political connection as possible. . . . Europe has a set of primary interests which to us have none or a very remote relation. Hence she must be engaged in fre- quent controversies, the causes of which are essentially foreign to our concerns. Hence, therefore, it must be unwise in us to implicate ourselves by artificial ties in the ordinary vicissitudes of her politics or the ordinary combinations and collisions of her friendships or enmities. Our detached and distant situa- tion invites and enables us to pursue a different course. If we remain one people, under an efficient government, the period is not far distant when we may defy material injury from external annoyance ; when we may take such an attitude as will cause the neutrality we may at any time resolve upon to be scrupulously respected; when belligerent nations, under the impossibility of making acquisitions upon us, will not lightly hazard the giving us provocation; when we may choose peace or war, as our interest, guided by justice, shall counsel. Why forego the advantages of so peculiar a situation? Why quit our own to stand upon foreign ground ? Why, by interweaving our destiny with that of any part of Europe, entangle our peace and prosperity in the toils of European ambition, rivalship, interest, humor, or caprice ? " 7 Under increasingly trying circumstances this policy was main- tained by John Adams. It was during his administration that a new factor arose to complicate the situation ; namely, the re- volt, actual or threatened, of the American colonies of France and Spain. The efforts of Miranda to obtain the support of the United States in carrying out his schemes for revolutioniz- ing South America have been noted elsewhere. Although his plans met with more or less favor in the eyes of Hamilton and some of his prominent contemporaries, yet they were never countenanced by the government. In connection with Santo i Richardson, Messages and Papers of the Presidents, I, 222. Digitized by Microsoft® THE UNITED STATES AND INDEPENDENCE 139 Domingo, however, there occurred during Adams's adminis- tration an incident which threatened to swerve the nation from its neutral course. As a result of the serious difficulties between France and the United States, Congress passed the Act of June 13, 1798, sus- pending commercial relations with France and her dependencies. This act threatened to create distress in the French part of the island of Santo Domingo, where the revolted inhabitants had been receiving many of their supplies from the United States. Here Toussaint L'Ouverture held sway nominally as comman- der in chief under the French, but in reality as an independent ruler. Acting on the suggestion of the American consul he sent an agent to the United States with a letter to the President con- taining the assurance that if commercial intercourse were re- newed between the United States and Santo Domingo, it would be protected by every means in his power. In consequence the President obtained from Congress a new act, approved February 9, 1799, which was intended to meet the situation. He also sent Dr. Edward Stevens, a friend of Hamilton's, to Santo Domingo with the title of consul general and with diplomatic powers. The British ministry dispatched General Maitland to the island with orders to go first to Philadelphia and arrange with the government of the United States a general policy with regard to Toussaint. Negotiations followed, which resulted on June 13 in a secret treaty between Toussaint and Maitland, by the terms of which the former agreed to abandon all privateering and shipping, receiving in return free access to those supplies from the United States which were required to meet the de- mands of his people. Stevens was not openly a party to this treaty ; but Toussaint believed him to be the real negotiator and his influence, no doubt, was paramount. Under the agreement supplies of every kind reached the island, and Toussaint was enabled to con- tinue the struggle for independence. He began the siege of Jacmel, for which he could not bring the necessary supplies Digitized by Microsoft® 140 PAN-AMEKICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS and materials by land. The seizure by English cruisers of a flotilla which, after his promise to abandon shipping, was bring- ing his munitions of war along the coast for the siege, made Toussaint fear for the result of his enterprise. Writing once more to the President, he requested him to send some frigates to enforce the treaty by putting an end to all trade with the island except such as the treaty permitted. The request was granted and the frigate General Greene was sent to cruise off Jacmel in February and March, 1800. Later, other vessels were sent. The French garrison was starved out and Jacmel was abandoned. When Jefferson became President, the situation changed. The treaty of Morfontaine, negotiated in the latter part of Adams's administration and ratified by the Senate in the first year of Jefferson's, restored relations between Prance and the United States. Santo Domingo was henceforth to be treated as a French colony and the negro chief to be left to his fate. 8 The treaty with Toussaint can be explained only in the light of the maritime warfare then existing between France and the United States. It by no means signified an abandonment of the policy of neutrality. Hamilton, in spite of his predilec- tions, wrote Pickering that the United States must not be com- mitted on the independence of Santo Domingo ; that it must give no guaranty, make no formal treaty, do nothing that could rise up in judgment. " It will be enough," he said, " to let Tous- saint be assured verbally, but explicitly, that upon his declara- tion of independence, a commercial intercourse will be opened, and continue while he maintains it, and gives due protection to our vessels and property." 9 A few weeks later, Adams, writing from Quincy on the proposed participation of the United States in a project of the British ministry for liberating Santo Domingo, raised the question as to whether it would not involve 8 Adams, History of the United States, I, 383-389. = February 9, 1799, Hamilton, J. C, The Works of Alexander Hamilton, VI, 395. Digitized by Microsoft® THE UNITED STATES AND INDEPENDENCE 141 the nation in a more inveterate and durable hostility with France, Spain, and Holland, and subject it more to the policy of Britain than would be consistent with its interest and honor. And he concluded that " it would be most prudent for us to have nothing to do in the business." 10 Sixteen years later he re- verted to the subject. Speaking of Jefferson's " reign," he said that he had expected it to be very nearly what it had been. " I regretted it," he said, " but could not help it. At the same time I thought it would be better than following the fools who were intriguing to plunge us into an alliance with England, an endless war with all the rest of the world and wild expeditions to South America and Santo Domingo." 1X The overthrow of the Spanish Bourbons by the Emperor Na- poleon in the spring of 1808 aroused anew the interest of the United States in the fate of Spain's American colonies. In October of that year, after news had reached America of the resistance of the Spanish patriots and of their victories over the French invaders, the subject was discussed in the cabinet and Jefferson recorded the result in his memoranda as follows : " Unanimously agreed in the sentiments which should be un- authoritatively expressed by our agents to influential persons in Cuba and Mexico ; to wit : ' If you remain under the do- minion of the kingdom and family of Spain, we are contented ; but we should be extremely unwilling to see you pass under the dominion or ascendancy of France or England. In the latter case, should you choose to declare independence, we cannot com- mit ourselves by saying we would make common cause with you, but must reserve ourselves to act according to the then existing circumstances; but in our proceedings we shall be influenced by friendship for you, by a firm feeling that our interests are intimately connected, and by the strongest repug- nance to see you under subordination to either France or Eng- land either politically or commercially.' " io Adams to Pickering, April 17, 1799, Life and Works, VIII, 634. 11 Adams to James Lloyd, April 5, 1815, Life and Works, X, 155. Digitized by Microsoft® 142 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS Writing a few days later to Governor Claiborne of Louisiana, Jefferson said: " The truth is that the patriots of Spain have no warmer friends than the administration of the United States, but it is our duty to say nothing and to do nothing for or against either." Repeating what he had written in his memoranda about Mexico and Cuba, he added : " We consider their inter- ests and ours as the same, and that the object of both must be to exclude all European influence from this hemisphere." 12 It was not until two years afterward that occasion arose for a more definite consideration of the matter. When news reached Washington of the important events taking place at Caracas, Buenos Aires, and elsewhere in the Spanish colonies, President Madison hastened to appoint agents to visit the prin- cipal centers of disturbance. One of these agents, Joel Roberts Poinsett, destined to play for many years an active and effective part in international Am erican affairs, was appointed to Buenos Aires. His instructions, dated June 28, 1810, contain, it may be presumed, an exposition of the policy which the government proposed to follow in the impending struggle. " As a crisis is approaching," ran the instructions, " which must produce great changes in the situation of Spanish Amer- ica, and may dissolve altogether its colonial relations to Europe, and as the geographical position of the United States and other obvious considerations give them an intimate interest in what- ever may affect the destiny of that part of the American con- tinent, it is our duty to turn our attention to this important sub- ject, and to take such steps not incompatible with the neutral character and honest policy of the United States as the occasion renders proper. With this view you have been selected to proceed without delay to Buenos Aires, and thence, if con- venient, to Lima in Peru or Santiago in Chile or both. You will make it your object, whenever it may be proper, to diffuse the impression that the United States cherish the sincerest good will toward the people of South America as neighbors, 12 Adams, History of the United States, IV, 340-342. Digitized by Microsoft® THE UNITED STATES AND INDEPENDENCE 143 as belonging to the same portion of the globe, and as having a mutual interest in cultivating friendly intercourse ; that this disposition will exist whatever may be their internal system or European relations, with respect to which no interference of any sort is pretended ; and that in the event of a political separation from the parent country and of the establishment .of an independent system of national government* it will co- incide with the sentiments and policy of the United States to promote the most friendly relations and the most liberal inter- course between the inhabitants of this hemisphere, as having all a common interest, and as lying under a common obligation to maintain that system of peace, justice, and good will which is the source of happiness for nations. " Whilst you inculcate these as the principles and disposi- tions of the United States, it will be no less proper to ascertain those on the other side, not only toward the United States, but in reference to the great nations of Europe, as also to that of Brazil and the Spanish branches of the government there; and to the commercial and other connections with them respectively, and generally to inquire into the state, the characteristics, in- telligence, and wealth of the several parties, the amount of the population, the extent and organization of the military force, and the pecuniary resources of the country. " The real as well as ostensible object of your mission is to explain the mutual advantages of a commerce with the United States, to promote liberal and stable regulations, and to transmit seasonable information on the subject." 13 Poinsett exceeded his instructions and became an enthusiastic collaborator in the propagation of revolutionary ideas. The Chilean historian, Barros Arana, 14 describes him as alert, ener- getic, intelligent, and profoundly democratic and liberal in his views. At Buenos Aires he appointed William Gilchrist as vice consul and proceeded to Chile, where he arrived in Decem- 13 Paxson, The Independence of the South American Republics, 107-109. i* Barros Arana, Historia Jeneral de Chile, VIII, 564. Digitized by Microsoft® 144 PAN-AMEKICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS ber, 1811. His arrival in Chile gave great satisfaction to the Patriots. He was received by the revolutionary junta with grand ceremony, as though he were a public minister accredited to a sovereign nation. The president, Jose Miguel Oarrera, welcomed him in a speech filled with the warmest expressions of friendship for the United States. Poinsett spoke briefly in Spanish, explaining the object of his visit and manifesting a spirit of international confraternity which greatly raised the hopes of the Chilean revolutionists. " The Americans of the North," said Poinsett, " view with the greatest interest the events taking place in these countries and they ardently desire the prosperity and happiness of their brothers of the South. I shall be pleased to inform the government of the United States of the friendly sentiments of your Excellency and I am happy to be the first to have the honor of establishing relations between two generous nations which should be united as friends and natural allies." 15 Everything appeared to justify the high ex- pectations of the Chileans. Poinsett became an active propa- gandist. The government looked to him for counsel, and on every hand he left it to be understood from his conversations that the government and people of the United States had the liveliest interest in the triumph of the revolution. He gave the impression that military supplies were to be easily obtained in the United States and he gave the names and addresses of manu- facturers and merchants who could furnish them. Chile wa3 soon to be disillusioned. The War of 1812 came on and distracted the attention of the United States from the events occurring in the southern continent. Moreover, the revo- lution in Chile received a backset as the result of civil strife which was followed by the temporary ascendancy of the Penin- sular authorities. Poinsett, desiring to take part in the war in which his own country was engaged, made his way back to the United States, but arrived after peace had been declared. His unneutral activities in Chile apparently passed unnoticed and is Ibid., 566 Digitized by Microsoft® THE UNITED STATES AND INDEPENDENCE 145 he continued to enjoy the confidence of the administration. Another of these early agents was Kobert K. Lowry. He was dispatched to Venezuela, and, as he arrived at his post ahead of Poinsett, he bears the distinction of being the first represen- tative of the United States in any of the revolted colonies. His conduct was more discreet than that of his colleague in Chile, though he maintained friendly relations with the revolutionists, and, it appears, gave the leaders counsel in their first essays at political organization. He remained in Venezuela throughout the period of revolution, was United States consul at La Guayra after the new states were recognized, and later engaged in busi- ness enterprises in Venezuela until his death some years later. In his annual message of November 5, 1811, President Madi- son declared that it was impossible to overlook the scenes " de- veloping themselves among the great communities which occupy the southern portion of our own hemisphere and extend into our own neighborhood. An enlarged philanthropy and an en- lightened forecast," he added, " concur in imposing on the na- tional councils an obligation to take a deep interest in their destinies, to cherish reciprocal sentiments of good will, to re- gard the progress of events, and not to be unprepared for what- ever order of things may be ultimately established." 16 The committee to whom was referred this part of the President's message reported in the form of a public declaration, a resolu- tion in which it was affirmed that the Senate and House of Representatives beheld with friendly interest the establishment of independent sovereignties by the Spanish provinces in Amer- ica; that as neighbors and inhabitants of the same hemisphere, the United States felt great solicitude for their welfare; and that when those provinces had attained the condition of nations, by the just exercise of their rights, the Senate and House would unite with the executive in establishing with them, as independ- ent states, amicable relations and commercial intercourse. 17 le Richardson, Messages and Papers of the Presidents, I, 494. 17 American State Papers, For. Rel., Ill, 538. Digitized by Microsoft® 146 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS From the instructions to Poinsett and from the declarations of the President and of Congress, it would appear that the United States thus early recognized the revolted colonies as belligerents. President Monroe declared at a later date, in fact, that the contest was regarded from the first " not in the light of an ordinary insurrection or rebellion, but as a civil war between parties nearly equal, having as to neutral powers equal rights." 18 Legally, however, the situation remained for some time without definition. This was due mainly to the following causes: First, diplomatic relations between the United States and Spain were suspended during the early years of the revo- lution. Casa Yrujo, the Spanish minister at Washington, was dismissed in 1806 and no new minister came to take his place until Luis de Onis arrived in 1809 as the representative of the Spanish Patriots. On account of the anomalous state of affairs in Spain, the United States declined to receive the new minister until a general peace was declared. 19 The exigencies of diplomatic intercourse with Spain then demanded that the situation be more clearly defined. Secondly, the conflict be- tween Spain and her colonies being carried on at first almost wholly on land, the demand for the formal recognition of bellig- erency was not urgent. And finally, the strained relations be- tween the United States and the two great maritime powers of Europe, resulting at last in war with one of them, kept the government at Washington absorbed in matters of more vital concern. Conditions having changed, the legal status of the revolted provinces could no longer be left in doubt. The first authorita- tive statement on the subject appears to have been contained in a letter of July 3, 1815, from the Secretary of the Treasury to the collector at New Orleans. It was the President's desire, the collector was informed, that intercourse with the revolted provinces should strictly conform to the duties of the govern- is Moore, A Digest of International Law, I, 173. v> Ibid., 131. See alao Onis, Memoir upon the Negotiations between Spain and the United States of America, 10-13. Digitized by Microsoft® THE UNITED STATES AND INDEPENDENCE 147 ment under the law of nations, the Act of Congress and the treaties with foreign powers; that there was no principle of the law of nations which required the United States to exclude from its ports subjects of a foreign power, in a state of insur- rection against their own government ; that any merchant vessel conforming to the laws of the United States was entitled to an entry to the customshouses whatever flag she might bear; that while a public war exists between two foreign nations, or when a civil war exists in any particular nation, the provisions of the Act of June 5, 1794, must be strictly enforced. A few weeks later the President issued under this Act a proclamation for- bidding the setting on foot in the United States of military expeditions or enterprises against the dominion of Spain. 20 Thus the belligerency of the insurgents was at last definitively recognized. Against the admission of vessels under the insurrectionary flags, Onis protested on the ground that it was subversive of the most solemn stipulations in the treaties between Spain and the United States. He maintained, moreover, that it was op- posed to the general principles of public security and good faith and to the law of nations; and that as the independence of none of these provinces had been acknowledged, it was an offense against the dignity of the Spanish monarchy and against the sovereignty of the king. He protested also against the activ- ities of a " factious band of insurgents and incendiaries " who were raising and arming troops in Louisiana " to light the flame of revolution in the kingdom of New Spain." Continuing, he declared that all Louisiana had witnessed those activities and that other expeditions under the ring-leaders, Jose Alvarez de Toledo and Jose Manuel de Herrera, the latter of whom had just arrived as representative of the Mexican Congress, were on foot to invade the dominions of his Catholic Majesty. 21 This 20 American State Papers, Fed. Bel., TV, 1. 21 Onis to the Secretary of State, December 30, 1815. American State Papers. For. Eel., IV, 422. Digitized by Microsoft® 148 PAN-AMEEICANTSM: ITS BEGINNINGS was the beginning of a voluminous correspondence which Onis carried on during the next five or six years with the State De- partment. The Spanish minister without doubt had grounds for com- plaint. But he was not without prejudice. He viewed every move with suspicion. Soon after his arrival he declared that there was no hope of obtaining anything favorable from the United States except " by energy, by force, and by chastise- ment." 22 And in 1812 he informed the viceroy of Mexico that the United States contemplated extending its southwestern boundary to the Bio Bravo ; that East Elorida and Cuba would be seized as West Florida had been; that emissaries of the United States had been sent throughout the Spanish possessions to foment revolution; that great assistance in arms had been given to Caracas and to Buenos Aires ; that an agent had been appointed to treat with the insurgents in Mexico and to offer them aid in money, arms, and officers ; that in order to remain on good terms with Spain the United States affected to give the greatest attention to the repeated remonstrances which had been made against the arming of privateers in its ports, and had in fact given strict orders to prevent violations of the laws; but that in spite of this, the government was then raising seventy- five thousand troops, on the pretext of taking Canada, but really for the purpose of robbing Spain of her colonies. 23 Alvarez Toledo, whom Onis mentioned as one of the " ring- leaders," was a Cuban by birth. He represented Santo Do- mingo in the Cortes at Cadiz, where his radical opinions made him obnoxious to the peninsular authorities. Fleeing to the United States he arrived at Philadelphia in September, 1811. He soon entered into informal relations with Secretary Monroe, to whom, it appears, he gave information of an alleged design 22 Onis to the Captain General of Caracas, February 2, 1810. American State Papers. For. Rel., Ill, 404. 23 Onis to the Viceroy of Mexico, Philadelphia, April 1, 1912. Alamfin, Historia de Mexico, III, app. 46. Digitized by Microsoft® THE UNITED STATES AND INDEPENDENCE 149 of Great Britain, acquiesced in by the Cortes, to take posses- sion of Cuba, Santo Domingo, and Porto Rico. Claiming to represent his Spanish American associates in the Cortes, he sought the aid of the United States in forming these islands into an independent confederation. Shortly before these informal relations began, a Mexican, Jose Bernardo Gutierrez de Lara, appeared at Washington as the diplomatic representative of Hidalgo's government, seeking assistance for his countrymen in men, money, and arms. The two agents became acquainted, and after further conferences with representatives of the State Department revealed the fact that the government would not give the desired assistance, they turned their attention to the organization of an expedition to invade Texas from the Louisiana border. 24 With a force com- posed of some four hundred and fifty Mexican refugees and American adventurers, the invasion began in August, 1812. 25 Gutierrez de Lara was nominally head of the expedition, but was later superseded by Toledo. The real commanding officer, however, was Colonel Augustus W. Magee, who resigned a commission as lieutenant in the United States Army to assume command. Hence the expedition is known to history as the " Gutierrez-Magee raid." Welcomed by the creole population and opposed but ineffectively by the weak Royalist garrisons, the invaders, styling themselves the " Republican Army of the North," marched through the province to the capital, San An- tonio de Bejar, where they established themselves and set about organizing a civil government. Here they remained until Au- gust, 1813, when a superior force of Royalists engaged them in a bloody battle and cut them to pieces. A few of the sur- vivors, among them Toledo and Colonel Perry, an able Amer- ican officer, escaped to Louisiana, where they joined with the 2* Cox, Monroe and the Early Mexican Revolutionary Agents. Am. Hist. Assn. Rep., I, 199-208. asAlaman, Historia de M4a>ioo, III, 481, McCaleb, The First Period of the Gutibrrez-Magee Expedition im, Texas Hist. Assn. Quar., IV, 229. Digitized by Microsoft® 150 PAN-AMEKICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS Mexican refugees and the adventurers of different nationalities, who, undiscouraged, were planning new undertakings. 26 It was against such enterprises, fomented for the most part by this polyglot group in Louisiana, that the Spanish minister urged the government to act. Before the correspondence of Onis with the State Department began, however, measures had been taken to frustrate the designs of the plotters. Arms sup- posed to be intended for an expedition which, according to ru- mor, was being organized by Colonel Perry were seized. It was later ascertained that Perry and a number of his follow- ers, crossed the border separately and embarking from some point below the mouth of the Sabine for the coast of Mexico, were wrecked and dispersed. Toledo and a number of his associates were indicted in the United States District Court of Louisiana, and this had a tendency to check their activities. 27 Toledo himself shortly afterward deserted the Patriot cause, and, proceeding to Spain, was received with open arms and sent as ambassador to Naples. 28 As to Herrera, whom Onis evidently regarded as particu- larly dangerous to Spanish interests, it appears that he never proceeded further than New Orleans, established no connections with the government at Washington, and accomplished nothing beyond dispatching small quantities of arms and ammuni tion to the insurgents. Associated with him was a Mexican, An- tonio Francisco Peredo by name, who was furnished with a limited amount of funds and authorized to procure merchant vessels and privateers to sail under the flag of the new repub- lic. 29 Exactly what Peredo accomplished is not clear; but as from this time a number of vessels were added to the Mexican fleet, it is to be presumed that he effected, with the concurrence of Herrera, some arrangement by which the acquisitions could as Alaman, Eistoria de Mexico, III, 480-492. Yoakum, History of Texas, I, 75-85. 27 American State Papers, For. Rel., IV, 431. 28 Alaman, Eistoria, de Mexico, IV, 395. 29 Ibid., 186, 395. Digitized by Microsoft® THE UNITED STATES AND INDEPENDENCE 151 be made. The authority to commission the vessels was dele- gated to Luis Aury, 30 formerly in the naval service of New Granada, and at this time, according to Yoakum, " Commo- dore of the fleet of the republics of Mexico, Venezuela, La Plata, and New Granada." 31 By what authority this office of " Com- modore " of the combined fleet was established, Yoakum does not explain; nor do other historians throw any light on the point. The title was of doubtful validity. But it is with Aury as an officer of the republic of Mexico that we are at present interested. In September, 1816, Herrera went with Aury and his fleet to Galveston Island, where a government for the province of Texas was organized under the Mexican republic. Aury was chosen civil and military governor. From Galveston as a base, the vessels of the fleet were sent out to cruise against Spanish commerce. Prizes were brought in and adjudicated in a Court of Admiralty in which Aury himself sat as a judge. 32 The men whom Aury gathered about him were not all of spotless character. Many of them had been followers of the pirate, Jean Lafitte, at Barataria, near the mouth of the Mississippi, until that establishment, harboring more than a thousand men, was broken up in 1814. It will be recalled that this band of freebooters under Lafitte had been pardoned by the President as a reward for the valiant part they played in the battle of New Orleans. They were now gradually returning to their old occupation of piracy and smuggling along the coast. It is not surprising, therefore, that among Aury's sea rovers, some should have failed to distinguish between friend and foe, espe- cially when specie or other valuable article formed part of the cargo ; that they should have found a way, as they did, to bring the slaves taken from Spanish slavers into the hands of Louisi- ana planters; that they should have disposed of the articles so Robinson, W. IK, Memoirs of the Mexican Revolution, 61. si Yoakum, History of Texas, 1, S8. 32 Ibid., I, 89. Digitized by Microsoft® 152 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS of merchandise, with which their numerous prizes were laden, to smugglers engaged in an illicit trade along the bays and bayous of the Louisiana coast. 33 Though Galveston was the base of this fleet, the vessels came with great frequency to New Orleans. At least on one occa- sion reported by the collector, there were six privateers in the port, commissioned by Aury. It was reported and generally believed that many of the vessels of Aury's fleet were owned by persons resident in New Orleans and enjoying the privileges of American citizens. In admitting these vessels, the collector averred, great care was taken not to permit any violation of the Neutrality Act; but in defiance of every precaution, they violated the law, not while in port, but before they left Amer- ican waters. Nothing was easier, said the collector, when a privateer was ready for sea, than to send both men and guns to Barataria, or any other convenient place where the vessel could sail, and take, them on board. At the end of the cruise the same farce would be played over again. Thus it might be said that each cruise began and ended at New Orleans. At- tempts had been made to secure convictions, but without suc- cess ; for witnesses were difficult to obtain. 34 It was by no means with the Southwest alone that the govern- ment had to deal in maintaining neutrality. Along the Atlantic seaboard, numerous unneutral activities mainly connected with privateering had to be watched for and, if possible, frustrated. Of this character was the Mina expedition, which sailed un- hindered from the port of Baltimore. Xavier Mina was born in Navarre, Spain, in 1789. In the war against the French invaders, he distinguished himself. He was captured in 1811 and held a prisoner in Erance until peace was declared. As soon as he was at liberty, he returned to Spain and, with his uncle, Espoz, raised the standard of revolt against the reaction- 33 American State Papers, For. Bel., IV, 134. Yoakum, History of Texas I, 92. si American State Papers, For. Rel., IV, 136. Digitized by Microsoft® THE UNITED STATES AND INDEPENDENCE 153 ary Ferdinand. The conspiracy having failed, he fled to Eng- land, where he was well received. It is said he was granted a pension by the British Government. Desiring to continue his revolutionary activities in Mexico, he obtained a ship, arms, and military stores from some " English gentlemen attached to the cause of freedom," and, setting sail, accompanied by fif- teen Spanish, Italian, and British officers, arrived at Balti- more in the summer of 1816. On the way over, four of the Spanish officers became disaffected, and, upon arriving in the United States, deserted the enterprise and gave such informa- tion of it as they possessed to the Spanish minister at Wash- ington, who immediately called upon the government to sup- press the threatened undertaking. But the complaints of the minister were not sustained by any positive data and the execu- tive did not think proper to interfere as long as Mina and his agents moved within the sphere of the laws of the republic. Quantities of military stores were put aboard the ship as cargo and, late in August, some two hundred " passengers " under the direction of Colonel the Count de Buuth, having em- barked, the vessel put to sea with a clearance for Saint Thomas. She was accompanied by a Spanish schooner which had been hired by Mina, and on board of which was Lieutenant Colonel Myers with a company of artillery. Mina and his staff sailed four weeks later aboard a fast sailing brig pierced for guns, joining the rest of the expedition at Port-au-Prince early in October. 35 Here Mina met Bolivar who had been driven a second time from his native shores. 36 From Petion, the negro president of the republic of Haiti, he received generous assist- ance, as had Bolivar a few months before. On October 24 the 35 Robinson, W. D., Memoirs of the Meaican Revolution, 43-55. The author of this memoir was an American who had spent some years in Venezuela and Mexico. He accompanied the Mina expedition to Mexico, was captured, and sent a prisoner to Spain. Escaping and returning to the United States, he published his memoir at Philadelphia in 1820. This is the account, with minor corrections, which Alaman follows in his Historic* de Mexico. so O'Leary, Memorias, XXVII ( Narraei6n I ) , 356. Digitized by Microsoft® 154 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS expedition, consisting of the brig, ship, and schooner, made sail for Galveston Island. Arriving safely the troops were dis- embarked and the work of organization and training was begun. Mina made a trip to New Orleans where he purchased a trans- port to replace the ship with which he left England, and, hav- ing arranged the purchase of another smaller vessel, he re- turned with a few American and European officers to Galveston. Among the recruits who joined Mina at Galveston Island was a small band of Americans under Colonel Perry. These, to- gether with a number of Aury's men and a few additions from miscellaneous sources, gave him about three hundred fighting men. On April 5, 1817, the expedition, accompanied by the whole Galveston Island naval establishment, sailed southward and, bearing down the coast, reached Soto la Marina, where a successful landing was made. Successes and reverses followed alternately during the next four or five months until finally Mina was captured. On November 11, 1817, he paid the pen- alty. He met death at the hands of a firing squad. 37 In discussing Mina's failure, Robinson, the historian of the expedition, declares that the first great obstacle which Mina had to contend against was the want of proper support from the mercantile world. The giving of such support, he main- tained, did not constitute either in the United States or Great Britain a breach of neutrality. " We have heard much," he said, " of the assistance which the Mexican Patriots have re- ceived from individuals in the United States; and indeed if we were to believe one tenth part of what the Chevalier Onis has stated on this subject, we might suppose that the American merchants had been liberal in the extreme in the supplies af- forded to the Mexican people; but the real fact is, that a single house in London has supplied a larger amount of arms and clothing to Venezuela than has been afforded by all the mer- chants of the United States to Mexico ; at the same time that 37 Robinson, Memoirs, 58-62, 78-80, 259. ' Digitized by Microsoft® THE UNITED STATES AND INDEPENDENCE 155 the royal armies [of Spain] -were fed and furnished with ammunition, ships, and every species of supply from our prin- cipal seaports." Continuing, he declared that the resources which Mina obtained at Baltimore were small, though in the eyes of the Spanish minister they were greatly magnified, the expedition becoming in his terrified imagination a formidable army. " It was in vain," says Robinson, " that Mina endeav- ored to convince some merchants of the United States of the ■advantages they would derive from the political and commercial emancipation of Mexico. It was in vain that he offered the most flattering terms for ample supplies; while the influence of the Spanish agents, through the contracts which they were enabled to bestow^ produced such an influence on the monied men, and the monied institutions of some of our principal cities, as to interfere materially with the necessities of Mina and the emancipation of Mexico." 38 But in Mina's case as in numerous other cases the neutrality laws of the United States were, doubtless, violated. The fail- ure to prevent these violations was due to certain defects in the laws. The Act as it stood did not give the executive, in cases where there might be reason to suspect an intention to commit the offense, authority to demand security or to adopt any other preventive measure. Thus it frequently happened that vessels belonging to citizens of the United States or to foreigners would arm and equip in the ports of the United States, and clearing as merchant ships, cruise as privateers under one or another of the belligerent flags, either immediately after getting to sea or after touching at other ports. In other instances, foreign vessels would abuse the privileges allowed in the ports, augment their armaments, as Mina did, and take on board citizens of the United States, who later assumed a mili- tary character. Accordingly, President Madison, in a special message to Congress of December 26, 1816, recommended the 38 Robinson, Memoirs, 262-263. Digitized by Microsoft® 156 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS adoption of such additional legislation as the situation might require. 39 On January 14, 1817, a bill was introduced in the House of Representatives and on March 3, following, after a long debate, in which Henry Clay led the opposition, it was enacted into law. This Act contained two provisions intended to remedy the defects in the old law. The first of these was a provision requiring the American owners, or part owners, of armed ships to give bond that such ships would not be used in hostilities against any " prince or state, colony, district, or people " with whom the United States was at peace. The second authorized the collectors of the customs to detain any vessel manifestly built for warlike purposes, when the arms and number of men shipped aboard, or other circumstances, rendered it probable that such vessel was intended to be used in violation of the law. 40 The law contained one other new feature. The statute of 1794 contemplated wars between " princes or states." This was disclosed as a defect in the case of Gelaton v. Hoyt, where the fitting out of the ship American Eagle for one of the Haitian combatants, Petion, to be used against another Haitian com- batant, Christophe, was held to be no offense, for the reason that neither of the chieftains had been recognized as a " foreign prince or state " under the statute of 1794. Hence the law of 1817 contemplates belligerents, princes, states, colonies, dis- tricts, or peoples. 41 This Act was superseded by the compre- hensive law of April 20, 1818, the provisions of which are now embodied in the Revised Statutes of the United States. 42 The Act of 1817 was passed in the House of Representatives by a vote of 83 to 62. The opposition did not spring from any widespread desire to intervene in the contest. It was at- tributable in part to party spirit, and in so far as it had any as American, State Papers, For. Rel., IV, 102-103. *o Annals of Congress, Hth Cong., 2d Bess., 477, 740, 1308. 4i Moore, A Digest of International Law, VII, 1076. Bemis, American Neutrality, 35. *2 Moore, Principles of American Diplomacy, 49. Digitized by Microsoft® THE UNITED STATES AND INDEPENDENCE 157 solid basis, it rested on the ground that the Act would increase the already existing inequality of condition as between the two contending parties. One of them, said Clay, had an accredited minister to watch over its interests, while the other had no organ through which to communicate its grievances. The na- tion being in a state of neutrality respecting the contest, and bound to maintain it, the question, according to Clay, was whether the provisions of the bill were necessary to the per- formance of that duty. " We ought to perform our neutral duties," he declared, " whilst we are neutral, without regard to the unredressed injuries inflicted upon us by Old Spain on the one hand, or to the glorious objects of the struggle of the South American Patriots on the other. We ought to render strict justice and no more." But, as the bill was not limited to that object, he could not give it his assent. 43 On the day following the enactment of this new legislation James Monroe was inaugurated President. He appointed as Secretary of State John Quincy Adams, then serving as min- ister to Great Britain. Adams was an unwavering advocate of the system of neutrality. When but twenty-six years of age, he wrote, under the signature of " Marcellus," several articles in which he contributed greatly, at the critical moment of Genet's arrival in America, to the formation of a sound public opinion on the subject. These writings commended him to the favor of Washington and won for him the appointment in 1794 as minister to the Netherlands. 44 Sent as minister to Prussia in 1797, elected United States Senator in 1803, returned to Europe as minister to Russia in 1809, named one of the com- missioners to negotiate a peace with Great Britain in 181.3, appointed minister to the court of St. James in 1815, Adams had enjoyed an unparalleled opportunity for acquiring a knowl- edge and grasp of the international situation commensurate with the high office to which he was called. Moreover, his long *s Annals of Congress, 14th Cong., 2d Bess., 740-743. « Adams, J. Q., Writings, I, 135, 148. Digitized by Microsoft® 158 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS residence in Europe had not left him unacquainted with the special set of relations which had developed between the United States and the belligerent communities in the southern part of the continent. Not only did he see those relations clearly but he saw more clearly, perhaps, than any of his contemporaries their wide-spreading European connections. Long before his return to the United States he had begun to point out the com- plications to which an abandonment of the traditional policy might give rise. In 1816 he told Del Real, a representative of New Granada, who called upon him in London, that the policy of the government of the United States, a policy dic- tated equally by duty to its own country, by amity with Spain, and by good will to the South Americans, was a strict and im- partial neutrality between them and Spain. And he explained that he meant by saying that the policy was dictated by good will to the South Americans, that the neutrality of the United States was more advantageous to them, by securing the neutral- ity of Great Britain, than any support which the United States could give them by declaring in their favor and making com- mon cause with them, the effect of which would probably have been to make Great Britain declare against both. 45 A few months later, commenting on news from the United States, he wrote : " There seemed to me too much of the warlike humor in the debates of Congress — propositions even to take up the cause of the South Americans. ... A quarrel with Spain for any cause can scarcely fail of breeding a quarrel with Great Britain." 46 But it was not merely with British hostility that the United States had to contend. " All the restored governments of Eu- rope," declared Adams, " are deeply hostile to us. The Royal- ists everywhere detest and despise us as Republicans. All the victims and final vanquishers of the French Revolution abhor us as aiders and abettors of the French during their career of 45 Adams to the Secretary of State, March 30, 1816, Writings, V, 551. is Adams to George William Brving, June 10, 1816, Writings, VI, 45. Digitized by Microsoft® THE UNITED STATES AND INDEPENDENCE 159 triumph. Wherever British influence extends it is busy to blacken us in every possible manner. In Spain the popular feeling is almost as keen against us as in England. Emperors, kings, princes, priests, all the privileged orders, all the estab- lishments, all the votaries of legitimacy eye us with the most rancorous hatred. Among the crowned heads the only friend we had was the Emperor Alexander, and his friendship has, I am afraid, been more than cooled." 4T Adams's view was not a passing fancy. About six months later he returned to the subject, expressing more emphatically than ever his belief in European hostility to the United States. " There is already," he said, " in all the governments of Europe a strong prejudice against us as Republicans, and as the primary causes of the propagation of those political principles which still made the throne of every European monarch rock under him as with the throes of an earthquake. . . . We are considered not merely as an active and enterprising, but as a grasping and ambitious people. We are supposed to have inherited all the bad quali- ties of the British character, without some of those of which other nations in their dealings with the British have made their advantage. They ascribe to us all the British rapacity, without allowing us the credit of the British profusion. The universal feeling of Europe in witnessing the gigantic growth of our population and power is that we shall, if united, become a very dangerous member of the society of nations. They therefore hope what they confidently expect, that we shall not long remain united. That before we shall have attained the strength of national manhood our Union will be dissolved, and that we shall break up into two or more nations in opposition against one another." 4S Thus, conscious of the difficulties and dangers of the interna- tional situation, Adams returned to America to take up at Washington the duties of Secretary of State. He found upon « Adams to John Adams, August 1, 1816, Writings, VI, 61. *8 Adams to William Plumer, January 17, 1817, Writings, VI, 143. Digitized by Microsoft® 160 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS his arrival a growing demand for the early recognition of the new states. This was due to the more hopeful aspect which their affairs were assuming. The United Provinces of Rio de la Plata had declared and were maintaining their independence ; San Martin had crossed the Andes and won the great victory of Chacahuco; Bolivar and his exiled followers had returned to Venezuela, where they were gradually gaining ground ; and finally, the Mina expedition had entered Mexico and friends of the Patriots in the United States entertained hopes of suc- cess in that quarter. The President, however, did not trust wholly in the correctness and comprehensiveness of the infor- mation which was reaching him. Accordingly he determined to seek the truth through agencies of his own choosing. He turned first to Poinsett, writing him a personal note on April 25, 1817, and asking him to undertake a mission to Buenos Aires. But having entered the legislature of South Carolina, Poinsett declined the appointment. Then the President settled upon a commission which was partly constituted at once by the appointment of Caesar A. Rodney and John Graham. The in- structions were prepared during the summer by Richard Rush, who, until Adams's arrival in September, filled the office of Secretary of State. On December 4, Rodney and Graham, with Theodorick Bland as the third member and Henry M. Brackenridge as secretary, sailed from Hampton Roads aboard the frigate Congress. At about the same time John B. Prevost was sent on a similar mission to Peru and Chile. 49 Two of the commissioners, Rodney and Graham, returned to the United States in July, 1818. Bland, who proceeded from Buenos Aires to Chile, returned in October. The work of the commission was not harmonious. Bland and Brackenridge quarreled and no two agreed. Each commissioner made a sep- arate report, those of Rodney and Graham being communicated to Congress in November and that of Bland in December. 60 i» Paxson, The Independence of the South American Republics, 119-121. so American State Papers, For, Rel., IV., 217-348. Niles' Weekly Reg- ister, XIV, 356. * * Digitized by Microsoft® THE UNITED STATES AND INDEPENDENCE 161 These reports were voluminous and in addition to them Brack- enridge published in two volumes, a few months later, an ex- tended account of the voyage and of the mission. Neither in the reports nor in Brackenridge's account was any important information given in addition to that already known. Accord- ing to Adams, Brackenridge was a mere enthusiast and so de- voted to South America that he wished to unite all America in conflict against all Europe. Bodney, who was suspected of being under his influence, traced the South American to the North American revolution, identifying them together in a manner which the President thought would be offensive to the European allies. His report, as did his personal efforts, tended to strengthen the party favoring immediate recognition. Gra- ham was less enthusiastic, and Bland held views which were not at all favorable to the Patriots. 51 But recognition became a pressing question before the com- missioners had even left the United States. In September, 1817, the subject was discussed in the Richmond Inquirer; and a few weeks before the opening of Congress the editor of the Intelligencer announced that, if the President failed to treat the subject adequately in his message, it would be taken up in the House of Representatives, where it would form a good theme for the display of oratorical abilities. 62 Monroe was im- pressed and presented the question to his cabinet for advice. The Secretary of State, finding that his colleagues were back- ward in giving their opinions, explicitly avowed his as opposed to the expediency of recognition. 53 That opinion prevailed, and in his annual message of December 2, 1817, the President lim- ited himself to expressions of sympathy and good will for the Patriots, and to a reiteration of the policy of neutrality. 54 The display of oratorical abilities began without delay. As soon as the President's message was received, a series of resolu- siAdama, J. Q., Memoirs, IV, 156, 159; V., 57. 52 Paxson, The Independence of the South American Republics, 126. 53 Adams, J. Q., Me/mows, IV., 15. 54 Richardson, Messages and Papers of the Presidents, II, 13. Digitized by Microsoft® 162 PAN-AMEFJCANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS tions embracing references of parts of it to appropriate com- mittees was introduced in the House of Representatives. To the first, relating to foreign affairs, Clay proposed an amend- ment instructing the committee to inquire what provisions of law were necessary to insure the American colonies of Spain their rights as belligerents. He was moved to this course in consequence of certain cases which had been tried under the neutrality laws, resulting in decisions unfavorable to the Pa- triot cause. He cited a case in point. Nine or ten British, disbanded officers desiring to join the Patriots, had sailed from Europe, and in their transit to South America had touched at Philadelphia. During their stay there they wore the arms and habiliments of military men, making no disguise of their inten- tion to participate in the struggle. They took passage in some vessel bound to a port in South America. A knowledge of this fact having come to the ears of the public authorities, a prose- cution was commenced against them, and, from their inability to procure bail, they were confined in prison. Clay felt, he declared, perfectly sustained in saying that, if such proceed- ing were warranted by the existing law, it was the imperious duty of Congress to alter the law. For the essence of neutral obligation, as he conceived it, was that the belligerent means of the neutral should not be employed in favor of either of the parties. It certainly did not require one nation to restrain the belligerent means of other nations. To further illustrate the point he referred to the application of the law to privateers. " We admit the flag of those colonies into our ports," he said ; " we profess to be neutral ; but if our laws pronounce that the moment the property and persons under the flag enter our ports they shall be seized, the one claimed by the Spanish minister or consul as the property of Spain, and the other prosecuted as pirates, that law ought to be altered if we mean to perform our neutral professions." Continuing, he declared that what- ever had been our intentions, our acts had been on one side; Digitized by Microsoft® THE UNITED STATES AND INDEPENDENCE 163 they all bore against the Patriot cause. We had had one great and magnanimous ally to recognize us; but no nation had stepped forward to acknowledge any of these provinces. The disparity between the contestants, said Clay, demanded a just attention to the party which was unrepresented ; and if the facts which he had mentioned and others which had come to his knowledge were correct, they loudly demanded the interposition of Congress. The amendment moved by Clay was agreed to without oppo- sition ; but it had no importance beyond offering an opportunity for expressions of sympathy for the Patriots and furnishing an occasion for an opening onslaught on the administration. 55 On one pretext or another, similar discussions were con- stantly recurring in the House until late in the spring, when the session adjourned. Early in December a resolution re- questing the President for information relative to the inde- pendence and political condition of the belligerent provinces led to discussion, which was renewed, a few days later, on a resolution calling for information respecting the Amelia Island affair. In January a bill for the general revision of the neu- trality laws was introduced and in March it was debated at some length and passed. That disposed of, discussion arose over a clause in the appropriation bill voting compensation for the commissioners to South Am erica. Then followed an ex- tended debate occasioned by an amendment offered by Clay to appropriate a sum of money for the outfit and salary of a minister to Buenos Aires. It was on this occasion that Clay spoke in advocacy of the " system of the New World," to which reference has been made elsewhere. This measure having been disposed of by an adverse vote, the discussions for this session came to a close. 56 On no occasion did the forces marshaled by Clay, though showing a strength which gave the administration ss Armals of Congress, 15th Cong., 1st 8ess., 40lHt04. so Hid., 406, 408, 1406, 1655. Digitized by Microsoft® 164 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS concern, accomplish their ends. Unhampered by Congress the executive continued to pursue the policy of neutrality. Recog- nition, however, as an issue was not dead. In August, 1818, Adams set forth very clearly in a letter to the President the principles upon which the act of recognition should be based. " There is a stage in such contests," he said, " when the party struggling for independence have, as I con- ceive, a right to demand its acknowledgment by neutral par- ties, and when the acknowledgment may be granted without departure from the obligations of neutrality. It is the stage when the independence is established as a matter of fact, so as to leave the chance of the opposite party to recover their do- minion utterly desperate. The neutral nation must, of course, judge for itself when this period has arrived, and as the bellig- erent nation has the same right to judge for itself, it is very likely to judge differently from the neutral and to make it a cause or a pretext for war, as Great Britain did expressly against Prance in our Revolution, and substantially against Holland. If war thus result in point; of fact from the measure of recognizing a contested independence, the moral right or wrong of the war depends upon the justice and sincerity and prudence with which the recognizing nation took the step. I am satisfied that the cause of the South Americans, so far as it consists in the assertion of independence against Spain, is , just. But the justice of a cause, however it may enlist indi- vidual feelings in its favor, is not sufficient to justify tbird parties in siding with it. The fact and the right combined can alone authorize a neutral to acknowledge a new and disputed sovereignty. The neutral may indeed infer the right from the fact, but not the fact from the right." 57 The subject of recognition again came under consideration in the early part of the following November. The President, who was drafting his second annual message, appeared to have some hesitation what to say, and requested Adams to sketch a 57 Adams, J. Q., Writings, VI, 442. Digitized by Microsoft® THE UNITED STATES AND INDEPENDENCE 165 paragraph on the subject. 58 The secretary complied, with the result that, when the message was sent to Congress a few days later, it embodied his views. They were briefly that there should be no departure from the neutral policy hitherto pur- sued. This he based upon two grounds : First, that the inde- pendence of none of the regions aspiring to statehood was estab- lished as a matter of fact; and secondly, that the European allies had undertaken to mediate between Spain and her col- onies. It was understood that the powers would confine their interposition to the expression of their sentiments, abstaining from the application of force. 59 And it was known that the mediation must fail, because there could be no resubjugation without the use of force. It was thought best, therefore, to let the experiment have its full effect, and after it had failed, as fail it must, the United States would then be at liberty to recognize any of the governments without collision with the allies. 80 Congress did not venture to dissent and thus for a time the matter rested. The President's third annual message, sent to Congress on December 7, 1819, contained, contrary to Adams's advice, 61 passages from which the Patriots might well draw encourage- ment. The progress of the war, said the President, had oper- ated manifestly in favor of the colonies. Their distance from the parent country and the great extent of their population and resources gave them advantages which, he believed, would be difficult for Spain to surmount. " The steadiness, consistency, and success," he declared, " with which they have pursued their objects, as evidenced more particularly by the undisturbed sovereignty which Buenos Aires has so long enjoyed, evidently give them a strong claim to the favorable consideration of other nations." But, he maintained, " it is of the highest importance 58 Adams, J. Q., Memoirs, IV, 164. 59 Richardson, Messages and Papers of the Presidents, II, 44. 6 ° Adams, J. Q., Memoirs, IV, 166. « Ibid., IV, 460-461. Digitized by Microsoft® 166 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS to our national character and indispensable to the morality of our citizens that all violations of our neutrality should be pre- vented." 62 The President did not succeed, however, as he had hoped to do, in forestalling discussion in Congress. Clay again intro- duced a resolution upon which he spoke on May 10, 1820, pro- viding for the outfit and salary of such ministers as the Presi- dent might deem it expedient to send to the new states. For- getting for the moment the principles of neutrality, to which he had always professed the strongest attachment, he declared that two years before would have been the proper time for recognizing the independence of the South ; for then the strug- gle was somewhat doubtful, and a kind office on the part of the government would have had a salutary effect. Since then nothing had occurred to make recognition less expedient. The independence of several of the provinces was, in fact, estab- lished; and as to their capacity for self-government every evi- dence was in their favor. The delay, Clay believed, was due to the excessive deference on the part of the administration for the powers of Europe. We had gone about, he said, among foreign powers, seeking aid in recognizing the independence of these states. Was it possible, he scornfully inquired, we could be content to remain looking anxiously to Europe, watching the eyes of Lord Castlereagh and getting scraps of letters, doubtfully indicative of his wishes; and sending to the Czar of Russia and getting another scrap from Count Nesselrode? " Why not," he asked, " proceed to act on our own responsi- bility, and recognize these governments as independent, instead of taking the lead of the Holy Alliance in a course which jeopardizes the happiness of unborn millions ? . . . Our insti- tutions now make us free ; but how long shall we continue so, if we mold our opinions on those of Europe? Let us break these commercial and political fetters; let us no longer watch the nod of any European politician; let us become real and «2 Richardson, Messages and Papers of the Presidents, II 59. Digitized by Microsoft® THE UNITED STATES AND INDEPENDENCE 167 true Americans, and place ourselves at the head of the American system." 6S Though Clay's resolution now passed the House, yet no action was taken by the executive. Accordingly, at the next session, the attack was renewed. After an ineffectual attempt to revive his old resolution, Clay introduced on May 10, 1821, a new one to the effect that the House joined with the people of the United States in their sympathy with the South Americans; and that it was ready to support the President whenever he should think it expedient to recognize their governments. The question was divided and the first part was carried by the vote of 134 to 12 ; and the second by 86< to 68. 64 The executive, however, was still unmoved. Recognition was not yet to be accorded. The " deference " of the administration for the powers of Europe, which Clay treated with such scorn, demands a word of explanation. It will be recalled that Adams returned to America in the summer of 1817 firmly convinced that the na- tions of Europe were moved by a strong feeling of hostility to- ward the United States. Moreover he had observed that in all their councils they showed a perpetual tendency to interference against the American insurgents, upon the principle of legiti- macy. 65 Nothing would have been easier, he believed, and with reason, than to precipitate a general conflict with mon- archist Europe arrayed against republican America. Such a conflict he desired by every means in his power to avoid. Hence the caution which Clay professed to believe was born of weakness. Monroe, though at times vacillating, shared his secretary's views. In a " sketch of instructions " 86 prepared early in 1819, in which he reviewed at length the policy of the govern- ment in the contest between Spain and her colonies, the Presi- dent explained the attitude assumed with respect to the Euro- 83 Annals of Congress, 16th Cong., 1st Bess., 2223-2230. e* Paxson, The Independence of the South American Republics, 142. 65 Adams, J. Q., Writings, VI, 176. eo Monroe, Writings, VI, 92-102. Digitized by Microsoft® 168 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS pean powers. The best service we could render the Patriots, < he thought, was to keep our ports open and to extend to them all the advantages enjoyed by Spain, at the same time promoting by communications with other powers a like neutrality on their part, so as to leave the future of the war to be decided by the parties themselves. If this were done the result could not be doubted. On the other hand, had we recognized them, there was much reason to believe that we should have given offense to every other power, and excited in them a disposition to coun- teract its probable effect. The least injury which could have attended such a measure, said the President, would have been to increase the indisposition of other powers to recognize the new states ; and it might have resulted in war with Spain, the allies being drawn into it equally against the United States and the colonies. By the course pursued, therefore, the United States had given the belligerent provinces all the advantages of recognition without any of its evils. Declaring that our relations with the allies were of the most friendly character, he continued as follows : " We have been long in free com- munication with them in favor of the colonies, pushing their cause to the utmost extent that circumstances would permit. Our object is to promote a recognition of their independence by the allies at the earliest day at which it may be obtained, and we are satisfied that tbe best mode of accomplishing it is by moving in concert with the allies, postponing the recognition on our part until it can be obtained from them, or until it shall be manifest that it will at least do no harm." In the course of time it became evident that nothing could be accomplished by concerted action with other powers. Eng- land, though gradually withdrawing from the European alli- ance and assuming an intermediate political position with re- spect to the Old and the New World, was not yet inclined to cooperate with the United States in the recognition of the new states. She had from the first, Lord Castlereagh declared in February, 1819, anxiously desired to see the controversy be- Digitized by Microsoft® THE UNITED STATES AND INDEPENDENCE 169 tween Spain and her colonies at an end, and had done her best to effect this result; but always upon the basis of the restora- tion of the supremacy of Spain. The intervention of force as a means of its accomplishment, however, she had ever repudiated. When some months later Lord Castlereagh assured the American minister that, in the event of a rupture between Spain and the United States, Great Britain would not take the part of the former, the danger of a general conflict with all Europe against America had vanished. 67 Whether or not the United States should recognize the new states was therefore reduced from a proposition based largely upon expediency to one based wholly upon the fact of independence. In a previous chapter it has been shown that that fact became clearly established in 1821. On March 8, 1822, the President transmitted to the House of Representatives certain documents called for by that body relating to the independence of the Spanish American prov- inces. In complying with the request, the President briefly reviewed the history of the struggle which had so long held the attention of the world. He declared that in Buenos Aires, Chile, Colombia, and Mexico it had been attended with com- plete success, and that these provinces " which had declared their independence and were in the enjoyment of it ought to be recognized." In proposing this measure, the President added, it was not contemplated to change our friendly relations witb either of the parties, but to observe as theretofore the most per- fect neutrality between them. 68 Congress concurring, made, some weeks later, the necessary appropriations. « Rush, The Court of London, III, 154. The British attitude was known in the belligerent colonies. Referring to the revolt of troops which occurred in Spain in 1820, Bolivar made the following estimate of the situation : — " She [England] fears revolution in Europe and desires it in America; there it gives her infinite concern, and here furnishes her inexhaustible resources. North America, pursuing its arithmetical course of business, will take advantage of the opportunity to acquire the Floridas, our friendship, and a dominion of trade. It is truly a conspiracy of Spain, of Europe, and of America against Ferdinand." Bolivar to Guillermo White, May 1, 1820. CVLeary, Memorias, XXX, 159. «s Richardson, Messages and Papers of the Presidents, II, 117. Digitized by Microsoft® 170 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGLTSTNLNGS On June 19, 1822, Manuel Torres was received as charge d'affaires from the republic of Colombia. Kelative to this in- cident, which was the first formal recognition of a Latin Amer- ican state by the United States, Adams makes the following interesting remarks in his Memoirs: " Torres, who has scarcely life in him to walk alone, was deeply affected by it. He spoke of the great importance to the republic of Colombia of this recognition, and of his assurance that it would give extraordi- nary gratification to Bolivar. The President invited him to be seated, sat down by him, and spoke to him with kindness which moved him even to tears. The President assured him of the great interest taken by the United States in the welfare and success of his country, and of the particular satisfaction with which he received him as its first representative." 69 Mexico was recognized on December 12, 1822, by the reception of Manuel Zozaya as minister plenipotentiary. 70 Buenos Aires and Chile were recognized on January 27, 1823, by the ap- pointment of Caesar Rodney and Heman Allen, respectively, as ministers plenipotentiary to those governments. Brazil was formally recognized by the reception of Senhor Rebello as charge d'affaires on May 26, 1824 ; the Central American states by the reception of Antonio Jose Canas, August 4, 1824; and Peru by the appointment of James Cooley as charge d'affaires to that government on May 2, 1826. 71 News of recognition by the United States was in due time disseminated throughout Latin America. It was treated in the public press as an event of transcendent importance. A single example may be cited. In the Oaceta de Colombia of June 2, 1822, a leading article commenting upon President Monroe's message of March 8, and upon the report of the Committee on Foreign Eelations to which the message had been referred, declared that these two documents " honor the United States 6» Adams, J. Q., Memoirs, VI, 23. to Manning, Ewrly Diplomatic Relations oetween the United States and Mewico, 12. ti Moore, A Digest of International Law, I, 90-92. Digitized by Microsoft® THE UNITED STATES AND INDEPENDENCE 171 as greatly as does the declaration of independence written by the pen of the i mm ortal Jefferson." Continuing, the writer said, among other things : " Palpable are the inconveniences to which undefined relations give rise. The increase of our commerce and of our industry since we became masters of our extensive coast lines should convince Europe and America of the necessity of entering into friendly arrangements with us upon matters of such high importance. A magistrate like Mr. Monroe, whose private opinions, it appears, have been con- stantly in opposition to the duties which his public character imposed, has been able with most propriety to take the initia- tive and to enlighten the whole world respecting the true state of a country which is to-day the object of the animadversions of our enemies and of the praises of our friends. The United States has always given careful attention to the origin and progress of the war in which its neighbors are engaged and in Which its foreign policy has been and is to some extent compro- mised. Its government never acted upon impressions of the 1 | moment. The deliberateness of its procedure, which is a mat- ter of comment in Europe, is an additional proof of the recti- tude with which it has acted on this occasion. There is noth- ing, therefore, which we can present so effectively to Spain and to the rest of Europe, to demonstrate the justice of our preten- sions, as the impartial judgment of a foreign nation which, established in our continent, has had frequent opportunity to observe our conduct and to give to our actions the merit which they deserve." Digitized by Microsoft® CHAPTER V INTKRHATIOiNAX. COMPLICATIONS The execution of the neutrality laws was a source of many difficulties to 'the government at Washington and required its constant watchfulness. The legislation of 1817 and 1818 was not sufficient in itself to prevent such violations as were prac- ticed with impunity under the old laws. There were still difficulties in the way of a perfect observance of neutral duty, the chief of which was the sympathy felt on all sides for the cause of the Patriots. Adams, who was less subject to its in- fluence than any of his distinguished contemporaries, repeat- edly testified in his writings to its existence. In 1812 he told Count Romanzoff, Chancellor of the Eussian Empire, that the government of the United States regarded with favorable senti- ments the change that was taking place in the Spanish prov- inces, believing it would be generally advantageous to the inter- ests of mankind. 1 In 1816 he said to the agent of New Granada in London, Del Real, that the general sentiment in the United States was certainly in their favor. 2 In 1817, commenting on one of Abbe de Pradt's pamphlets, Les trots derniers mois de I'Amerique Meridionale, he declared that " the republican spirit of our country not only sympathizes with people struggling in a cause so nearly, if not precisely, the same which was once our own, but it is working into indignation against the relapse of Europe into the opposite principle of monkery and despot- ism." s In 1818 he remarked to Onis that if Spain had taken more pains to adjust her differences with the United States, there would probably have been less ardor in the country against i Adams to the Secretary of State, February 29, 1812. Writings, IV, 300. 2 Adams to the Secretary of State, March 30, 1816. Writings, V, 551. 3 Adams to John Adams, December 21, 1817, Writings, VI, 275. 172 Digitized by Microsoft® INTERNATIONAL COMPLICATIONS 173 Spain and consequently less in favor of the South Americans. 4 If the testimony of such a witness were not sufficient, abundant corroboration might be found in the writings of Jefferson, Madi- son, Monroe, and others. Moreover the debates preserved in the annals of Congress show that the nation's legislators with- out exception desired to see the Patriots succeed; and similar views were generally reflected in the public press. The inde- pendence of the Spanish colonies was, indeed, according to a foreign observer, Hyde de Neuville, " the only cause popular here." 8 The Spanish Americans themselves were convinced of the sympathy of the citizens of the United States, if not of that of the government. " Here as well as in Spain and in every other nation," said Juan German Roscio in 1819, " it is well not to compare the operations of the government with the sentiment of the people and of individuals, in order not to impute to them the intrigues and vices of their rulers, or of their system of ad- ministration. The great majority of the people of the United States are decidedly for our cause." And he goes on to men- tion the fact that in the invasion of Texas in 1813 and of Mex- ico in 1817 a large number of Americans took part; that a great part of the privateers sailing under the Patriot flags were fitted out and manned in the ports of the United States; that the juries never conformed to the " unneutral " Act of 1817, and that the state of Kentucky had made a declaration in favor of their cause. 6 It is readily to be understood what an obstacle this propen- sity to sympathize with the cause of the Patriots constituted for the government in the execution of the neutrality laws. Through its influence citizens who were otherwise law-abiding embarked shamelessly upon illegal enterprises in aid of the in- surgents; Federal judges failed to render strict justice under 4 Adams, Memoirs, TV, 200. 5 Hyde de Neuville, Memoirs et Souvenirs, II, 203, 205. « Urrutia. Pdginas de Historic, Dvplom&tica, 207. For the Kentucky resolutions, see Niles' Weekly Register, XIII, 371. Digitized by Microsoft® 174 PAN-AMEFJCANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS the law; and executive officers of the government not only winked at violations but actively aided and abetted them. Pri- vateering after 1815 was the chief source of annoyance. Un- fortunately it came to be disgraced by a buccaneering and pi- ratical spirit for which citizens of the United States were largely responsible. The vessels were " for the most part fitted out and officered in our ports and manned from the sweepings of our streets." 7 The center of illicit enterprises shifted from New Orleans and the Southwestern border to the Atlantic sea- board and more particularly to the port of Baltimore. In the course of time Baltimore became so notorious in its failure to suppress the illegal acts of the privateers that the matter was made the subject of a memorial by the government of Portugal to the Congress of Sovereigns at Aix-la-Chapelle. A declaration of displeasure concerning these practices was entered upon the protocols of the conferences and it was agreed that amicable expostulations concerning it should be made to the United States. 8 When Hyde de Neuville told Adams of the action of the Con- gress of Sovereigns, the secretary vented his wrath in a long entry in his journal. " The misfortune," he wrote, " is not only that this abomination has spread over a large portion of the merchants and of the population of Baltimore, but that it has infected almost every officer of the United States in the place. They are all fanatics of the South American cause. Skinner, the postmaster, has been indicted for being concerned in the piratical privateers. McCulloh, the collector, Crawford says, is a very honest man, but only an enthusiast for the South Americans and easily duped by knaves, because he thinks all other men as honest as himself. . . . The district judge, Hous- ton, and the circuit judge, Duval, are both feeble, inefficient men, over whom William Pinkney, employed by all the pirates as their counsel, domineers like a slave driver over his negroes. i Adams to A. H. Everett, December 29, 1817. Writings, VI, 282. 8 Adams, Memoirs, IV, 317. Digitized by Microsoft® INTEKNATIONAL COMPLICATIONS 175 After the pirates were indicted last September, and before they were tried, a piece was published in the National Intelligencer, threatening that any judge who should condemn them could not be expected to live long, either as a judge or as a man. The paper containing this piece was sent under a blank cover to Judge Houston just before he opened court. He read the paragraph in open court, blustered about his independence and how impossible it was to intimidate him, and then (as well as Judge Duval), Wirt says, was perfectly subservient to what- ever Pinkney chose to dictate. Middleton told me that he had seen that threatening piece in the handwriting of Skinner, the postmaster, one of the parties indicted. When the trials came on, Glenn [district attorney] wrote to me asking to be assisted in the management of the causes. I prevailed upon the Presi- dent to direct the Attorney-General, Wirt, to assist him; but Wirt considered it as extra official, and made the public pay him fifteen hundred dollars for losing the causes. The grand jury indicted many, and the petit jury convicted one man, but every one of the causes fell through upon flaws in Glenn's bills of indictment. The conduct of the juries proves the real sound- ness of the public mind. The soldiers are good men and true. But the officers ! the commanders ! what with want of honesty in some and want of energy in others, the political condition of Baltimore is as rotten as corruption can make it. Now that it has brought the whole body of European allies upon us in the form of remonstrances, the President is somewhat concerned about it, but he had nothing but directions altogether general to give me concerning it. I must take the brunt of the battle upon myself, and rely upon the justice of the cause." 9 Some time after this Adams received information from Brackenridge which put a still worse light on the whole affair. It appears that Theodorick Bland and the Baltimore postmaster, Skinner, who was his son-in-law, together with others associated with them, had entered into relations with the Carreras, exiles Adams, Memoirs, IV, 318. Digitized by Microsoft® 176 PAN-AMEEICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS from Chile and Buenos Aires and conspirators against the exist- ing governments there. They had lent these political refugees large sums of money and had obtained from them stipulations for exclusive privileges of commerce for a period of years. This private speculation, Adams believed, was the source of all the excitement stirred up in the newspapers during the autumn of 1817 over the question of recognition. The articles were written by Skinner aided by some others. The same cabal obtained the appointment of Bland as one of the commission- ers and made him their private agent to recover from the gov- ernments of Buenos Aires and of Chile the moneys lent to the Carreras. These connections of Bland, with their links of attachment to the Baltimore privateering piracies, influenced and pervaded his conduct as a commissioner and were the cause of his quarrel with Brackenridge. 10 " It is, in theory," said Adams, " one of the duties of a President of the United States to superintend in some degree the moral character of the public officers who hold their places at his pleasure. But the difficulty of carrying it into practice is great, and the number of instances in which I see corrup- tion of the deepest dye, without being able to punish or even to displace it, is among the most painful appendages to my situa- tion." " Adams evidently felt that, if the President had used his authority to remove certain Federal officers who were guilty of corrupt practices, the neutrality laws would have been more strictly observed. This doubtless was true. In certain cases the President was lenient. There was, however, no disposi- tion on his part toward a general tolerance of these irregulari- ties. On the whole, the administration adopted effective means to enforce neutrality. The legislative branch of the government lent its cooperation by passing early in 1819 "An act to pro- tect the commerce of the United States and punish the crime of piracy." This law -empowered the President to instruct the '» Adams, Memoirs, V, 158. 11 Ibid., V, 159. Digitized by Microsoft® INTEENATIONAL COMPLICATIONS 177 naval commanders of the United States to capture any vessel committing piratical aggressions upon ships of the United States or of any other nationality; and it authorized merchant vessels owned by citizens of the United States to resist aggres- sions by all vessels except the public armed ships of the nations in amity with the United States. Finally, a section of the law prescribed the death penalty for persons convicted of piracy as denned by the law of nations. 12 A few months after the passage of this act an expedition was sent out under Commodore Perry to carry it into execution, to communicate the terms to the governments of Venezuela and Buenos Aires, and at the same time to make representations to those governments against the privateering piracies carried on in their names and under their commissions. 13 A number of piratical vessels were captured and within the next year some ten or twelve of the pirates were executed, executions taking place at Boston, Baltimore, Charleston, Savannah, and New Orleans. A number of others of the culprits, after trial and conviction, were pardoned. 14 Although the executions produced a salutary effect, yet piracy continued for several years longer to thrive, especially around the island of Cuba. In the course of time the incipient South American navie3 be- coming better organized, the line between legitimate privateer- ing and piracy was more clearly distinguishable. Thus the task of suppressing the pirates became less complex and less likely to cause international friction. In the meantime, however, numerous cases of friction did occur, involving not only the relations of the United States with the European powers, but with the new states and Brazil as well. With the latter the situation became tense. Brazil, it will be remembered, was raised in 1815 to the dignity of a kingdom coordinate with the mother country. As long as the !2 Annals of Congress, 15th Cong., 2d Seas., 2523. ™ Adams, J. Q., Memoirs, TV, 389. "Adams, J. Q., Writings, VII, 45; Memoirs, V, 147. Digitized by Microsoft® 178 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS court resided at Rio de Janeiro, Brazil was in effect the Portu- guese power. The memorial on privateering presented to the Congress of Sovereigns may be regarded, therefore, as having been presented by Brazil. And Brazil had cause to protest. It will be recalled that the territory now constituting the re- public of Uruguay, the Banda Oriental, was occupied in 1816 by the Portuguese who, after driving out the forces of Buenos Aires and of the independent leader, Artigas, occupied Monte- video. Retiring northward, Artigas continued the struggle to recover Montevideo. Though he had no port, he managed to enlist a number of privateers in his service. The Portu- guese minister, the Abbe Correa, made frequent complaints to the State Department at Washington of the depredations of these privateers, which he declared were fitted out and officered and manned in the ports of the United States. Adams be- lieved that the situation was so serious that if the United States had been the injured party it would have declared war without hesitation. 15 The Abbe Correa resided for many years in the United States, first as a fugitive from the Inquisition and afterward as minister plenipotentiary. In 1820 he returned to Brazil. At that time he was seventy years of age, though, as Adams described him, full of spirit, vivacity, and wit. " He is among the men I have known," said Adams, " one of the most enter- taining conversation." Just before returning to Brazil, he went upon a visit to Jefferson, to whom he talked much about an American system, in which his government and that of the United States should be united, and, by concert with the Eu- ropean powers, should agree to keep the coasts of this hemi- sphere clear of pirates, on condition that they should clear the seas of the Eastern Hemisphere of the Barbary pirates. Jeffer- son was disposed to favor the project and thought that it might be carried into effect so that the United States vessels might be withdrawn from the Mediterranean. But Monroe believed, and ib Adams, Memoirs, V, 177. Digitized by Microsoft® INTEKNATIONAL COMPLICATIONS 179 Adams was of the same opinion, that an American system upon that plan would be an alliance between the United States and Portugal against the South American independents, which was hardly reconcilable with any just view of our policy. 16 Insisting that it was impossible for Portuguese subjects to obtain justice in the courts of the United States, Correa pro- posed the appointment of special commissioners to investigate their complaints. Told by Adams that such an arrangement was impossible, the Portuguese minister painted the situation in the darkest colors. Adams reported to the President, in part as follows : " These things had produced such a temper hoth in Portugal and in Brazil against the people and govern- ment of the United States that he was unwilling to tell me the proposal which had been formally made in the King's Council concerning them. That five or six years ago the people of the United States were the nation of the earth for whom the Portu- guese felt the most cordial regard and friendship. They were now those whom they most hated, and if the government had considered the peace as at an end, they would have been sup- ported in the declaration by the hearty concurrence of the peo- ple. . . . The desire of the king was to be on good terms with the United States, but the property of his subjects was robbed upon the high seas by pirates sallying from the ports of the United States, without the trouble to assume a disguise. This practice was continued year after year in the midst of profes- sions of friendship from the American Government. It was impossible that he should put up with it." 17 Events over which the United States had no control had already solved this difficulty with Brazil. Unknown to the Portuguese minister, the power of Artigas had been completely broken some months before and he was already a prisoner in Paraguay. Other events which soon followed — the return of the king and his court to Portugal in 1821 and the declaration i« Adams, Memoirs, 172, 176. 17 Adams to Monroe, August 30, 1820, Writings, VII, 70. Digitized by Microsoft® 180 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS of independence by Brazil in 1822 — marked the beginning of a new era in the relations between these two great American states. Other incidents caused friction between the United States and the new governments. The privateering enterprises of Thomas Lloyd Halsey, the United States agent at Buenos Aires, resulted in his dismissal. Another representative at Buenos Aires, W. G. D. Worthington, though not violating neutrality, did swell upon his agency, as Adams expressed it, until he broke out into a self-accredited plenipotentiary, 18 causing his dismissal also. The government of Buenos Aires was no less unfortunate in its early representatives to the United States. The first, Martin Thompson, sent to Washington in 1816, was dismissed' by his government for having transcended his author- ity in granting commissions. 19 Manuel H. de Aguirre, who succeeded him the next year, suffered persecution, personal humiliation, and imprisonment. He was commissioned by his government to obtain the recognition of Argentine independ- ence and to induce the United States to favor the interests of the new states. 20 And as a private agent of Chile, in addition to his public representation of Buenos Aires, he was authorized to build and dispatch six sloops of war to aid in the expedition against Peru which was then being organized. 21 Arriving in the United States during the summer of 1817, Aguirre had an interview with the President and with the Sec- retary of State, Rush, the latter of whom informed him that nothing in the law prevented the building and sending away the vessels as a commercial speculation. 22 Not until October 29, did he communicate with the government on the subject of recognition. Receiving no reply, he wrote again on December is Adams, J. Q., Memoirs, IV, 158 ; V, 93. is Palomeque, Origenes de la Diplomacia Argentina, I, 28. Adams, J. Q., Memoirs, IV, 46. 20 Mitre, Historia de Belgrano, III, 309. 2i Adams, J. Q., Memoirs, IV, 123, 22 Ibid., IV, 124. Digitized by Microsoft® INTERNATIONAL COMPLICATIONS 181 16. "My government," he said, "considering that of the United States as one of the first of whom it ought to solicit this acknowledgment, believed that the identity of political prin- ciples, the consideration of their inhabiting the same hemi- sphere, and the sympathy so natural to those who have expe- rienced similar evils, would be so many additional reasons in support of its anxiety. . . . The recollection that it was these states which first pointed out to us the path of glory, and the evidence that they are enjoying most fully the blessed effects of liberty, inspire me with the conviction that it is for them also to show that they know how to appreciate our efforts." 23 Failing in his effort to obtain recognition, Aguirre went to New York, where he had two sloops of war constructed, his funds not being sufficient for more. It was in this transaction that his troubles arose. At the instigation of the Spanish con- sul, he was once arrested in the streets, and at another time he was taken out of bed at midnight. For some weeks, his house became " a mere house of marshals and sheriffs and officers of the law." 24 When the vessels were ready for sea they were attached for personal debts of the captains in whose names they were registered. His officers and crews had been bribed; his funds were exhausted; and the two sloops were lying at New York at an expense of a thousand dollars a day. Aguirre's only resource was to sell them. But, being built as vessels of war, they were not salable for purposes of commerce. Hence, he turned to the government, complaining bitterly of his treat- ment and inquiring if it would purchase the vessels. At the President's request, Adams wrote to Aguirre inform- ing him that the executive was not authorized to make the pur- chase. Explaining that the interpretation and exposition of the laws, under the free institutions of the United States, be- longed peculiarly to the judiciary, and rem in ding Aguirre as a stranger, unacquainted with the legal provisions of the United 23 American State Papers, For. Bel, IV, 180. « Adams, J. Q., Memoirs, IV, 123. Digitized by Microsoft® 182 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS States, he might have recurred to professional men of eminence for advice, Adams continued as follows: " You have, therefore, constantly been aware of the necessity of proceeding in such a manner, in executing the orders of your government, as to avoid violating the laws of the United States, and although it has not been possible to extend to you the privilege of exemption from arrest (an exemption not enjoyed by the President of the United States himself, in his individual capacity), yet you have had all the benefit of those laws which are the protection of the rights and personal liberties of our citizens. Although you had built and equipped, and fitted for sea, and manned, two vessels suitable for purposes of war, yet as no proof was adduced that you had armed them, you were immediately liberated and dis- charged by the decision of the judge of the Supreme Court, be- fore whom the case was brought. It is yet impossible for me to say that the execution of the orders of your government is impracticable ; but the government of the United States can no more countenance or participate in any expedient to evade the intention of the laws than it can dispense with their oper- ation." 2B Shortly afterward Aguirre made the financial ar- rangements necessary to enable him to take the vessels away. As they sailed unarmed, their departure was not hindered by the government. 26 Three questions connected with the acquisition of Florida affected to a greater or less degree the relations of the United States with the belligerent provinces. The first of these was the occupation of West Florida, The strip of territory lying south of the thirty-first parallel, between the Perdido Eiver on the east and the Mississippi on the west, and known as West 25 Adams to Monroe, August 27, 1818, Writings, VI, 450. as The vessels reached Buenos Aires in November, 1818. One of them later joined the Chilean Navy. The other was taken away by her captain to Rio de Janeiro and sold to the Portuguese Government, the failure of the Buenos Aires Government to pay the crew and to reimburse the captain for funds advanced by him being alleged as the reason. Barros Arana, Historia Jeneral de Chile, XII, 280. Digitized by Microsoft® INTERNATIONAL COMPLICATIONS 183 Florida, was claimed by the United States as a part of the Louisiana purchase. It had never been delivered to the French, however, and it continued under Spanish rule until 1810, when the inhabitants, as elsewhere in Spanish America, rose in revolt. Representatives of the several districts convened at Baton Rouge and on September 26, 1810, declared the territory to be a free and independent state. The convention then requested the government at Washington to take the infant state under its " immediate and special protection, as an integral and inalien- able portion of the United States." The President deemed it " right and requisite " that possession should be taken of the territory, but on the ground of the claim to it under the treaty of cession. Accordingly, ignoring the independent government established there, he ordered Governor Claiborne to occupy the territory and administer it as a part of the Orleans Territory. 27 This transaction appears to have aroused at the time no re- sentment on the part of the Patriots in Mexico or in South America. The next incident, however, did affect to some extent the relations of the United States with certain of the new states. This was the suppression of an insurgent establishment on what is known as Amelia Island at the mouth of St. Mary's River, near the boundary of the state of Georgia. The facts of the case are stated by the President in divers messages to Congress. 28 In the summer of 1817, Amelia Island was taken possession of by persons claiming to act under the authority of some of the revolutionary governments. As the island lay within territory which had long been the subject of negotiation with Spain, its occupation excited surprise. The unfolding of the undertaking, however, in the opinion of the President, marked it as a mere private, unauthorized adventure. " Projected and com- menced," he declared, " with an incompetent force, reliance m American State Papers, For. Rel., Ill, 395-397. For a full history see The West Florida Controversy by Isaac Joslin Cox. 28 Richardson, Messages and Papers, II, 13, 23, 32, 40, 51. December 2, 1817; January 13, 1818; November 16, 1818; January 30, 1819. Digitized by Microsoft® 184 PAX-AACEBICAXISM: ITS BEGEsXESGS seems to have been placed on what might be drawn, in defiance of our laws, from within our limits; and of late, as their re- sources have failed, it has assumed a more marked character of unfriendliness to us, the island made a channel for the illicit introduction of slaves from Africa into the United States, an asylum for fugitive slaves from the neighboring states, and a port for smuggling of every kind." ^ Moreover, like Galveston Island, the place was made the rendez- vous for privateers illegally fitted out in the ports of the United States. Under the secret Act of January 15. 1511. the President was empowered to occupy any part of East Florida in the event of an attempted occupation by any foreign government or power. 30 The Spanish authorities hav- ing made a feeble and ineffectual attempt to dislodge the in- vaders, the executive dispatched the United States ship John Adams, Captain Henley commanding, to the island with in- structions to break up the establishment. This was accom- plished with the cooperation of land forces in the batter part of December, 1517. 31 Subsequently the United States held flie place, subject to negotiations pending with Spain. The President expressed full confidence that the revolutionary governments would disclaim any connection with the enterprise, and the several agents who were being dispatched toward the end of 1S17 to South America were instructed to bring the sub- ject to the attention of the governments which they might visit. Aguirre, the Argentine agent, declared to Rodney and Bland before they set out for Buenos Aires, that the adventurers never had any authority from his government whatever: that in his judgment the United States was fully justified in breaking up the establishment ; and that he was assured it would be consid- ered in the same light by his government. 32 . O'Higgins, the Director of Chile, declared to Bland that he had never heard 29 Richardson, Messages and Papers, II, 14. so American State Papers, For. Bel., IT, 132. 3i Xiles" Weekly Register, XHI, 347. 32 Adams, J. Q., Memoirs, IV, 46. Digitized by Microsoft® INTEKNATIONAL COMPLICATIONS 185 • of such a place as Amelia Island. 88 And Bolivar assured Ir- vine, an agent sent to Venezuela, that his government had no knowledge of or part in the enterprise. 84 Mexico and New Granada, the other governments supposedly connected with the scheme, appear to have made no formal disavowal. The former possessed no responsible revolutionary government at the time, and as the latter was on the point of union with Venezuela, its failure to disavow, if indeed it did fail to do so, need not be regarded as a serious omission. Inasmuch as certain recent Spanish American writers at- tribute to Bolivar the design of erecting a barrier in the Gulf of Mexico against the expansion of the United States toward the south, it will be of interest to inquire further into the insurgent occupation of Amelia Island with a view to determining whether or not it constituted a part of any such plan. Although there is much about the affair that remains obscure, yet certain facts, relating especially to the chief actors, throw light upon it. Sir Gregor McGregor was the leader of the expedition which took possession of the island. Sir Gregor had then been in America for several years, having gone first to Venezuela in 1811. There he served under Miranda, rising to the rank of brigadier general. After Miranda's downfall, he joined Bolivar in the renewed struggle, and on a number of occasions distin- guished himself. For a short time in 1816, during Bolivar's absence, he was in chief command of the forces in northern Venezuela. Later he surrendered the command to General Piar and abandoned the country. Had he already been designated as the leader of the Amelia Island expedition ? Such evidence as is available proves the contrary. Early in 1817 news of his being at Saint Thomas was published in the United States. The reasons assigned for his quitting Venezuela were " the futility of his endeavors to establish concert, discipline, and a regular government." 85 That he abandoned the Venezuelan ss American State Papers, For. Rel., IV, 292. 8* Richardson, Messages and Papers of the Presidents, II, 42, so Niles' Weekly Register, XI, 380. Digitized by Microsoft® 186 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS cause in disgust is confirmed by Larrazabal, by Baralt, and by the anonymous author of a Voyage to the Spanish Maim. 90 It is further confirmed by circumstances and by the character of the man. After the close of the Napoleonic wars, foreign officers flocked to the standards of the revolutionists in great numbers. These officers, among whom many were unfit for the positions which they received, were inclined to despise the na- tive officers under whose orders they had to serve. Hostility of the natives to the foreigners naturally arose, leading many of the latter to quit the service. Sir Gregor was an exceedingly vain man and it is not unlikely that the surrender of the com- mand, the exercise of which for a short time must have given him great satisfaction, to a native officer whom doubtless he regarded as his inferior, was more than his pride could bear. McGregor now had no other aim, apparently, than to seek some new field of adventure in which he could himself be the chief figure. His exploits were heralded to the world. It was reported that he was proceeding to Mexico ; that upon arriving at Saint Thomas he had immediately recruited one hundred and fifty " choice spirits of various nations and complexions " ; that with these he had embarked for Port-au-Prince, expecting to raise there enough men to get a footing in Mexico, where he sup- posed the natives would flock to his standard. He is next heard of at Baltimore, but without followers. 87 On March 31, 1817, he was commissioned at Philadelphia by certain " deputies of Free America " to take possession, either wholly or in part, of East and West Florida. 38 With a small expedition organized in the United States, he proceeded to Amelia Island, which he took without a struggle. His plans were next to attack St. Augustine. But almost immediately dissensions arose, and in September he resigned. Louis Aury, who put into the harbor sa Vida de Bolivar, I, 444; Resume* de la Historia de Venezuela, I, 285. Narrative of a voyage to the Spanish Main in the. whip Two Friends, The occupation of Amelia Island by. McGregor, etc. n Niles' Weekly, XI, 380. »s Executive pqgument, 15th Cong., 1st Sesa., No. 175, 33. Digitized by Microsoft® INTERNATIONAL COMPLICATIONS 187 about the time McGregor resigned, assumed command. Sir Gregor, it was reported, sailed away for England in his priva- teer, The General McGregor, to arrange his personal affairs. In 1819 he made a descent on Porto Bello, which he captured. Although this place lay within the territory claimed by the new republic of Colombia, Sir Gregor acted independently. 39 Sur- prised by Spanish forces and compelled to flee, he next estab- lished himself on the Mosquite shore, where he adopted the title of his Highness Gregor, Cacique of Poyais. In this enterprise he failed also. In 1839, he was naturalized by the Venezuelan Government and restored to his former military rank. His death occurred, it is said, at Caracas a few years later. 40 It is even more clear that Aury as the head of the Amelia Island enterprise was not an agent of Bolivar. The privateer- ing activities of this buccaneer, pirate, or patriot, 41 as he is vari- ously called, have already been adverted to. He was originally a French sailmaker, becoming afterward a sailor. He lived in Santo Domingo until 1813. He then offered his services to the Patriots of New Granada, who gave him a commission as lieu- tenant in their navy, and promoted him afterward to the rank of commandant general of their naval forces. 42 In 1816, when the exiled leaders of Venezuela and New Granada met at Aux Cayes, in the republic of Haiti, to adopt measures for renewing the war, Aury alone opposed the election of Bolivar as supreme chief with full military and civil authority. But he was joined by Montilla, Bermudez, and a few others who were also discon- tented with Bolivar's leadership. This small group attempted to break up the Venezuelan expedition by offering extraordinary rewards to those who would enroll in the service of Mexico. 89 0'Leary, Memoriae, XVI, 390. *o Lee, Dictionary of National Biography, XXXV, 95. *i It is of especial interest to note that Alaman ( Historia de Mexico, TV, 553) calls him "the chief of the pirates." See also Adams, J. Q., Memoirs, TV, 58. Parton {Life of Andrew Jackson, II, 423) says that he seems to have been a man of honor, sincerely devoted to the cause. « Adams, J. Q., Memoirs, TV, 75; Executive Document 115, 15th Cong., 1st Sess., 36. Digitized by Microsoft® 188 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS Failing to interfere materially with Bolivar's plans, Aury, with his band, proceeded to join the Mexicans. 43 His establishment at Galveston, his appointment as civil and military governor of Texas, and his connection with the Mina expedition have been noted. After having convoyed Mina's vessels down the coast of Mexico, he established his headquarters for a while at Mata- gorda Bay. Thence he proceeded late in the summer of 1817 to Amelia Island to join McGregor. Assuming command un- der the doubtful authority of the commission issued to him by the Mexican, Herrera, he hoisted the Mexican flag. 44 After his departure from Amelia Island he was employed in the serv- ice of Colombia. 45 It appears, then, that Bolivar had no connection with either of these agents. But what of his relation to the principals? McGregor's commission was signed by Lino de Clemente as Deputy of Venezuela; by Pedro Gual as deputy for New Granada, and as proxy for F. Zarate, the Mexican deputy ; and by Martin Thompson as deputy for Buenos Aires. 46 Of these, Lino de Clemente and Gual alone need be considered; for Thompson was without standing in Buenos Aires and, more- over, he was dismissed for exceeding his authority. The Mexi- can representative appears to have had no part in the undertak- ing. Clemente was most active in promoting the enterprise. He was Bolivar's brother-in-law, having married Maria Antonia de Bolivar. He was sent as an agent to the United States early in 1817. Nothing in the published documents and correspon- dence shows that in the Amelia Island affair he acted on any but his own responsibility; though there is some evidence that Bolivar did not strongly condemn the conduct of his agent. Writing to Clemente after the conference with Irvine, Bolivar said that his reply had reduced itself to a declaration that the 43 Larrazabal, Vida de Bolivar, I, 417. 44 Executive Document 115, 15th Gong., 1st Sess., 16. Adams, J. Q., Writings, VI, 284. 45 O'Leary, Memorias, VIII, 510. 46 Executive Document 175, 15th Cong., 1st Sess., 34. Digitized by Microsoft® INTERNATIONAL COMPLICATIONS 189 government of Venezuela was ignorant of what was going on at Amelia Island and that it did not recognize either McGregor or Aury as legitimate parties to the contest against Spain unless they had received authority from some independent government. " Mr. Irvine," he added, " expressed the greatest satisfaction at this reply, although it was nothing more than a private opinion confidentially expressed." 47 Moreover Bolivar now dispatched to Clemente an appointment as envoy extraordinary and minis- ter plenipotentiary near the government of the United States. 48 This appointment proved to be offensive to the government at Washington. But there is no reason to believe that it was so intended. Irvine, another of the " mere enthusiasts," in all probability, had not given Bolivar any reason to suppose that Clemente's actions in the United States were regarded there as reprehensible. The administration, however, took a decidedly different view of them, and when Clemente, after receiving his commission, presented himself at Washington and requested a conference, the Secretary of State, by direction of the President, replied in the severest terms. " I have to inform you," he wrote, " that your name having been avowedly affixed to a paper, drawn up within the United States, purporting to be a commis- sion to a foreign officer for undertaking and executing an ex- pedition in violation of the laws of the United States, and also to another paper avowing that act, and otherwise insulting to this government, ... I am not authorized to confer with you, and that no further communication will be received from you at this department." 49 When Clemente shortly afterward re- turned to Venezuela, he not only manifested great resentment toward the United States, but insisted that the Venezuelan Government approve his conduct in the Amelia Island affair. Bolivar being absent from the seat of government, it fell to 17 Bolivar to Lino de Clemente, July 24, 1818. Urrutia, P&gmas de His- toria Diplomdtica, 120. ^Ibid., 116. 49 Adams to Lino de Clemente, December 16, 1818, Am. State Papers, For, Bel, IV, 414. Digitized by Microsoft® 190 PAN"-AMEKICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS the vice president, Zea, to pass upon the matter. Zea denied Clemente's request, and in writing to Bolivar on the suhject expressed the opinion that the United States was well disposed toward the cause of the Patriots and that the impolitic con- duct of Clemente had alone prevented a positive declaration in their favor. 50 Of Gual's connection with Amelia Island less in known. He resided there for a time and took part in the management of the establishment. Adams, who regarded him as the most re- spectable of all the men connected with the enterprise, leaves it to be inferred from an entry in his journal that Gual's con- duct may have been influenced by his desperate circumstances and by the lack of means of subsistence. The President, how- ever, regarded the project as peculiarly Gual's own, and at- tributed to him a feeling of acrimonious resentment for its failure- 51 The names of Xavier Mina and Alvarez de Toledo were also connected with the enterprise. When the establishment was sup- pressed, Aury designated one of the adventurers, Vicente Pazos, to inform the United States of the grounds on which " this part of East Florida was dismembered from the dominions of the King of Spain." In his exposition, Pazos declared that the en- terprise was decided upon in consequence of the arrival, in the summer of 1816, of Mina from England and of Toledo from New Orleans ; and in consequence of the interception of a dis- patch indicating the probable transfer of the Eloridas to the United States. The plan was to launch two simultaneous at- tacks from Port-au-Prince under Mina and Toledo. But the damage sustained by Mina's fleet in a storm and the desertion of Toledo, says Pazos, frustrated the plan. 62 It has already been stated that Mina and Bolivar met at Port-au-Prince. The two leaders discussed their respective so Zea to Bolivar, June 8, 1819. O'Leary, Memorial, XVI, 398. si Adams, J. Q., Memoirs, IV, 775; VI, 146. E2 Executive Document 115, 15th Cong., 1st Sess., 23. Digitized by Microsoft® INTERNATIONAL COMPLICATIONS 191 plans, Mina having already proposed by letter the union of their forces in the liberation first of Mexico and then of Vene- zuela. This combination Bolivar did not approve. 53 Nor does it appear that either Bolivar or Mina designed measures for the wresting of Florida from Spain. Robinson, the historian of the Mina expedition, mentions in this relation only an over- ture made to Mina by certain persons at New Orleans for an attack upon Pensacola. This overture Mina rejected because it appeared to be nothing more than a mercantile speculation. " As a soldier and as a patriot," says Robinson, " he disliked to war for mercenary considerations and he was most decidedly hostile to all predatory projects." 54 But the occupation of Florida may have formed at one time a part of Mina's plans. These plans, it will be recalled, were laid in England, and there, if anywhere, the plot to keep the United States out of Florida was hatched. During the War of 1812 the British used Florida as a base of operations against the United States, and after the war a certain Colonel Nicholls and other British subjects, among whom were Arbuthnot and Ambrister, remained there to perpetuate British influence. 55 During 1815 the English papers frequently discussed the sub- ject of Florida, in a tone hostile to the United States. Rumors of the cession of the province by Spain to Great Britain were constantly circulated. 56 It was even reported that there was in preparation an expedition of ten thousand men, to be sent out from Great Britain and Ireland to take possession of it. The intimations of these things reaching Washington were so strong and confident that Adams was finally instructed to bring the matter to the attention of the British Government. 57 In Feb- ruary, 1816, he obtained from Castlereagh the assurance that there was not and never had been any foundation for the re- 53 Larraz&bal, Yida. de Bolivar, I, 442. M Robinson, Memoirs of the Mexican Revolution, 69, 76, 261. 55 Bassett, Life of Andrew Jackson, 253. " Niles' Weekly Register, IX, 197, 200, 215, 252. w Monroe to Adams, December 10, 1815. Monroe, Writings, V, 380. Digitized by Microsoft® 192 PAN"-AMEKICA]$riSM: ITS BEGIKNTNGS ports. " Military positions," he said, " may have been taken by us during the war of places which you had previously taken from Spain, but we never intended to keep them. Do you only ob- serve the same moderation. If we shall find you hereafter pursuing a system of encroachment upon your neighbors, what we might do defensively is another consideration." 58 Later, when the expedition against Amelia Island was being organized in the United States, McGregor went to Bagot, the British min- ister at Washington and, unfolding the plans for taking Florida, asked him what the opinion of the British Government upon it would be. Bagot replied that he could give no answer to that question and could say nothing about it. In the Seminole War the British subjects, Mcholls, Arbuthnot, Ambrister, and others, incited the Indians to hostilities against the United States, and the fact that they acted in concert with McGregor was established. The British Government, however, disavowed the acts of its subjects. 59 Hyde de Eeuville, who kept his government informed of the Amelia Island affair, was convinced that the British Govern- ment was back of it. In June, 1817, he expressed his views in the following terms : " The eclat of this expedition, the funds which have been put into it, the affectation on the part of the leaders of encouragement by the Federal Government, the origin of McGregor, his secret relations with English agents, his con- fidences to some of the members of his party, all concur to con- vince me of what I have sought to make sure of ; that is, that it is chiefly English influence which is at work in the ports of the United States and that McGregor is nothing more than a British agent. The English wish to compromise the Americans ; they wish to create for themselves a pretext and to mask their own ambition, from the necessity of putting a check on that of the Federal Government. If Florida is attacked by the insurgents, the adventurers of the Union will flock to them from all sides. es Adams to Monroe, February 8, 1816. Adams, Writings, V, 502, so Adams, J. Q., Memoirs, IV, 50, 179, Digitized by Microsoft® INTERNATIONAL COMPLICATIONS 193 The English would then have to choose whether to come to the aid of Spain against the Americans, or to support openly the insurgents, in either case under the pretext of the conduct of the government and people of the United States." Three months later, Hyde de Neuville, though still believing that Mc- Gregor was a British agent and that his mission was to make trouble and to compromise the Americans, thought that he had indirectly served the Americans, as the attack on Amelia would result in forcing Spain to the cession of the Floridas. A year later he again declared : " McGregor is certainly an agent of the English Government." 80 In maintaining that the British Government directly sup- ported the Amelia Island enterprise, Hyde de Neuville was in error, if the declarations of that government are to be credited. But the complicity of certain British subjects does not admit of question. What part they may have had in conceiving the plan is not known and, indeed, the final word on the subject cannot be spoken until the facts relative to its origin are revealed. Of all the explanations of the undertaking, however, the most im- probable is that which attributes it to distrust of the United States on the part of Bolivar or of other influential Spanish' Americans. That sentiment was the conjecture of a later day. The South American promoters of the scheme for seizing the Floridas, whatever hidden motives may have instigated their backers, professed to act in no unfriendly spirit toward the United States. They maintained that the occupation of Florida by the Patriots would in every way be beneficial to the United States, especially since Spain had manifested a willingness to transfer it to some European power. It is true that the United States had declared more than once that it would not consent to such a transfer and for obvious reasons; but it was no less obvious, they insisted, that those reasons did not apply to the other American states. The French or the English in Florida would be commercial and political rivals, whereas the Patriots »» Memoirs et Souvenirs, II, 271, 324, 369. Digitized by Microsoft® 194 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS ■would be friends politically and commercially. With the inde- pendence of Florida established, they said, it would be recog- nized as a part of the confederation of South America ; but this they did not -wish to have interpreted as denying to the people of Florida the right to become a part of the United States if they and the people of the United States so desired. 61 The suppression of the Amelia Island establishment appears to have aroused no great resentment except on the part of the insurgent agents in the United States. A long article, it is true, was published in the Correo del Orinoco, 62 the semi-official organ of the Venezuelan Government, in which the action of the United States was severely criticized. But this article has every evidence of having originated with Lino de Clemente, and it is to be doubted whether it reflected any widespread feeling among the leaders of Venezuela. That Bolivar knew nothing about the inception of the undertaking and that he did not ob- ject to the acquisition of the Floridas by the United States is singularly confirmed by two of his letters. Writing to Piar on June 14, 1817, about the time the Amelia Island expedition was ready to set out, Bolivar said : " Brion writes me of the early arrival of McGregor from Baltimore with seven large ves- sels loaded with arms and munitions. They are coming to join Brion and us." 63 A little more than a year laiter, writing to Bricefio, and referring in a spirit of exultation to the victory of San Martin in Chile, and to the campaigns in Venezuela and New Granada, he declared : " The day of America has arrived, and everything appears to announce the end of our glorious and terrible struggle. The war of the United States leaves now no doubt. The American general, Jackson, has taken by assault «i Urrutia, Pdgmas de Historia Diplomdtica, 108. 62 Blanco-Azpurfia, Documentos, VI, 565-570. It is to be noted also that Eoscio, Secretary for Foreign Affairs at Angostura, and one of the editors of the Correo del Orinoco, was in the United States early in 1818 just after the suppression of the Amelia Island establishment. He returned later in the year to Venezuela. Blanco- Azpurua, Documentos, VT, 360. 63 O'Leary, Memorial, XXIX, 111. Digitized by Microsoft® INTERNATIONAL COMPLICATIONS 195 the fort of Pensacola, and the Floridas, East and West, are in the possession of the Americans." 6 * The third of the Florida incidents which, it is sometimes said, affected the relations of the United States with the revolutionary governments, was the negotiation and final ratification of the treaty of cession. The United States had long desired to ac- quire the Floridas and efforts were repeatedly made during Jefferson's presidency to hring Spain to agree to the transfer. The breaking off of diplomatic relations between the two coun- tries in 1806 put an end to the discussions and the matter re- mained in abeyance until relations were restored in the early part of Monroe's first administration. Negotiations were then renewed and, under the able direction of John Quincy Adams, brought to a successful conclusion on February 22, 1819, when the treaty of cession was signed. The United States Senate im- mediately ratified the treaty, but Spain delayed; and the final act giving full force to the instrument, the exchange of ratifica- tions, was not consummated until exactly two years after the date of signature. 65 It has been charged that in these negotiations with Spain the United States pursued a purely selfish policy; that its one great desire being to acquire the Floridas, everything else was subordinated to that end ; specifically, that the neutrality law of 1817 and the long-deferred recognition of the new states were a part of the price which the government at Washington had to pay for the cession of the Floridas. 66 The charge is, of course, without foundation. The system of neutrality, already a tra- ditional policy of the nation, had the preponderant support of public opinion and of all branches of the government. The executive, being responsible for recognition, withheld it not in order to facilitate the negotiations with Spain, but on solid grounds of fact. The Spanish Government attempted, it is 6* Cartas de Bolivar (Sociedad de Ediciones) , 236. 65 Davis, Treaties and Conventions concluded between the United States and other Powers, 785. es Calvo, Recueil des TraiUs, V, 174, 17S, Digitized by Microsoft® 196 PAN-AMEKICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS true, to exact a promise as a condition of the ratification of the treaty that the United States should abandon the right to recog- nize the revolutionists or to form relations with them ; 67 and, though the promise was not given, the Spanish Government, it seems, regarded the United States as morally bound. Such at least is the inference from the protest which the Spanish minis- ter at Washington made to the Secretary of State upon learning of the President's message of March 8, 1822, proposing the recognition of the new states. " How great my surprise was," he wrote, " may be easily judged by any one who is acquainted with the conduct of Spain toward this republic, and who knows the immense sacrifices which she has made to preserve her friendship. In fact who could think that, in return for the cession of her most important provinces of this hemisphere ; for the forgetting of the plunder of her commerce by American citi- zens ; for the privileges granted to their navy ; and for as great proofs of friendship as one nation can give another, this execu- tive would propose that the insurrection of the ultramarine pos- sessions of Spain should be recognized ? " 68 It is to British rather than to Spanish sources, however, that the aspersions on the motives of the United States in the Florida negotiations are to be traced. In this, much more than in the Amelia Island affair, the British manifested a spirit of jealous resentment and of suspicion, and their attitude was reflected, as they desired it should be, in the minds of some of the Spanish American leaders. As soon as it became known in England that the Treaty of Cession had been concluded, certain British agencies, if not the government itself, began to take measures to counteract the supposed advantage which the United States had obtained by the peaceable transfer of the Floridas, and which, it was feared, would now be greatly increased by an early recognition of the new states. A leading article published in the London Times of April 19, 1819, is typical of the means <" Davis, Notes upon the Treaties of the United States, 153 es American State Papers, For. Rel., J V, 845. Digitized by Microsoft® INTEKNATIOKAL COMPLICATIONS 19? employed. Declaring that Great Britain and every Christian nation had an interest in seeing the war between Spain and her colonies terminated, the writer continued as follows : " It cannot be said that America [the United States] has not an interest in the conclusion of these fatal troubles; at least she has shown that she has been able to sack no small advantage from their continuance and that to our great and lasting detriment. Old Spain having rejected arbitration may carry on the contest more feebly and more feebly still, till at last she may concede all her trans-Atlantic possessions to America, one after another, simply because she herself is unable to reduce them, and because Amer- ica finds their occupation necessary for the tranquillity of her contiguous provinces." Having raised before the eyes of the Spanish American as- pirants for statehood the specter of absorption by the United States, the writer reassures them by suggesting the means of their salvation. " Are we to stand by," he inquires, " and suffer a procedure which in its sinister effect upon us will have all the consequences of collusion between Old Spain and the United States? Are we to refrain from intercourse with the insurgent provinces of South America (simply because the Spanish Government at home calls itself at war with them) till they drop at last exhausted into the hands of our great com- mercial rival ? The court of Madrid will be pleased to observe that America has been paid for her forbearance. If she has hitherto abstained from acknowledging the trans- Atlantic states, she has had her price for it, in the cession by Old Spain of cer- tain wealthy provinces. Far indeed from Great Britain be such conduct as this ! Far removed from us be the baseness of extorting a bribe from the impotence of the old government in order to induce us to disown the rising liberties of the new ones ! No ; let us remember that we are England still ; that we have an established name for honor and integrity, as well as for valor and enterprise, among the nations of the world ; and that, if we have hitherto abstained from interfering in the sanguinary Digitized by Microsoft® 198 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS troubles which desolate the fields and towns of New Spain, it has been from dignity and moderation, not from the sordid hope of gain. We have not hovered like the vulture over the contend- ing armies till we could seize a breathless carcass for our prey." Continuing, the writer becomes more specific and reveals the secret of his choler. It was not the fear that the United States might become sovereign throughout the continent, but the fear that it might gain in the American family of nations a moral predominance detrimental to the interests of Great Britain. " We believe it is some time," he says, " since America proposed to us to acknowledge the government of Buenos Aires. This is an important fact; and so far the conduct of America ap- peared to be candid and friendly to England. We know not whether her secret objects might not be to quicken Spain in her bargain about the Floridas. However, the result is such as we have seen. America has not acknowledged any of the in- surrectionary states as she proposed to us ; and she has accepted a valuable cession from the court of Madrid. Hence, therefore, commences a fresh epoch in the war. Shall we suffer this or any similar traffic to succeed ? We do not use the language of menace; there is no occasion to go to war; but shall we allow America to reap first the advantage of many valuable posses- sions from Old Spain as the price of withholding her acknowl- edgment of the Patriot governments; and then shall we suffer her to insure the gratitude of those Patriot governments by being still the first to treat with them as independent ? Amer- ica cannot deny this fact — she is at present leagued with Old Spain against the colonies. She has accepted the Floridas as the price of that union; for we know that she did propose to us to acknowledge the new states ; that she has not so acknowl- edged them; and that she has, without the slightest pretext of justice, accepted the Floridas from Old Spain. She has in familiar language, been, for a while at least, bought off. Our course is now, therefore, not one of our own choosing, it is im- posed on us by the necessity of things; we cannot, without Digitized by Microsoft® INTERNATIONAL COMPLICATIONS 199 madness, desist from acknowledging the independence of Buenos Aires and the other Spanish provinces. The court of Madrid must have looked to this as a result, when it gained the forbear- ance of the United States by consigning to them the Floridas in our detriment; and we should be sunk into a very abject con- dition, indeed, if we allowed Spain to think it of more impor- tance, even to purchase the neutrality of America than to retain ours as a boon, or as the natural consequence of our disinter- estedness." Articles published in foreign newspapers, and especially in those of Great Britain, relating to the struggle between Spain and her colonies were widely copied in papers which had sprung up in those parts of Spanish America controlled by the revolu- tionists. The " leader " of the London Times was no excep- tion. In the latter part of August, 1819, a translation of it appeared in the Correo del Orinoco and it may have been in- serted in other South American papers. A curious evidence of its effect is found in the instructions of September 1, 1819, 69 to Manuel Torres, who had been appointed to succeed Lino de Clemente as agent of the Venezuelan Government in the United States. In the instructions to Torres, Juan German Roscio, the Secretary for Foreign Affairs, declared that in the light of the Times article of April 19, the conduct of the United States had acquired a new meaning. It is now revealed, says Koscio in substance, that the eyes of the United States have been upon the Floridas from the beginning, and though there may have been some other motive for the Neutrality Act of 1817, the obvious one was the acquisition of the Floridas. But, having come into possession of the coveted territory, the United States will be more likely to give its support to the Patriots. Unlike the British writer, Eoscio drew comfort from the probability of such an outcome. In instructions of July 7, 1819, to Pefialver and Vergara, agents of Venezuela to Great Britain, the question of Florida eo Urrutia, Pdginaa de Historia Diplomdtica, 138-140. Digitized by Microsoft® 200 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS is considered more at length. 70 Roscio here says that there are two things to note relative to the Neutrality Act of 1817 : First, that the United States, being desirous of acquiring the Floridas, sacrificed its neutrality, convinced that any act of hostility to- ward the Patriots would contribute to the attainment of the de- sired end ; and secondly, that the British minister at Washing- ton was most active in promoting the passage of the Act. With- out reflecting, one might judge from this, said Roscio, that Great Britain did not desire the emancipation of Spanish Amer- ica ; but, viewing the matter in its true light, the English Gov- ernment appeared to be striving to deprive the United States of the advantages which it might obtain from an independent South America, indebted to the elder republic for generous as- sistance. The object of the maneuver was to bring the United States into bad odor with the Patriots, so that in commercial and other relations it would receive but little consideration, whereas Great Britain would gain favor with the Patriots by giving them commercial and military aid. Returning again specifically to the subject of Florida, Roscio ventured the opinion that the English Government would not be pleased at the transfer of that territory to the United States, increasing thus the political importance of the American Confederation. And finally, he said that if it were true that Spain had money to send another expedition to America, it must have come from the sale of the Floridas. 71 To what extent views such as those expressed by Roscio pre- vailed it is impossible to say, but there is reason to believe that they were not generally held. The great mass of the Spanish American population knew nothing about the Floridas, and the great majority of the leaders, it appears, were either indifferent to their fate, or regarded their acquisition by the United States as a natural outcome of the break up of the Spanish Empire. to Urrutia, Pdginas de Eistoria Diplomdtica, 202-204. 7i By the terms of the treaty the United States undertook to make satis- faction for the claims of American citizens against Spain to an amount not exceeding $5,000,000. No money was paid directly to Spain. Digitized by Microsoft® INTEKNATIONAL COMPLICATIONS 201 The latter was the point of view of the author of an article pub- lished in the Correo del Orinoco, while the ratification by Spain of the treaty of 1819 was pending. During the Peninsular War, according to this writer, there was neither Spanish nation nor true sovereign, and the United States would have been justified in taking out of the ruin of the empire in payment of its claims, a part of what was being saved. But, added the writer, it should be said to the honor of the American republic, whether it was due to respect for that part of the people who were struggling for independence or to confidence in the justice and in the sincerity of him who then aspired to the throne, or whether it was due to the belief that the opportune moment had not arrived, it abstained from taking advantage of the weakness of its opponent. The occupation of the Floridas in 1818 and the failure of the other nations, from whom Spain expected support, to protest, demonstrated that the United States could, whenever it desired, obtain justice. It was then, therefore, that the treaty was concluded. After discussing the causes which were delaying the ratification of the treaty, the -writer concluded that, if a new war should be the result of the refusal of Spain to comply with its obligation, the Americans would seize the two Floridas without difficulty and would advance into New Spain, where the people were awaiting and would welcome their coming. The Floridas would then be held by right of conquest. Mexico would be avenged, the debts of Spain would remain unpaid, and the rest of America would have acquired indirectly a powerful ally. 72 The reference to Mexico serves to raise the question as to what was really the attitude of that country to the transfer of the Floridas to the United States. As has already been intimated, the revolution in Mexico during these years had reached such a low ebb that it seems futile to attempt to discover its official at- titude toward any important question. In consequence of the precarious situation, newspapers did not spring up until later, T2 Blanco-Azpurtia, Documentos, VI, 371. Digitized by Microsoft® 202 PAN-AMEKICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS and contemporary documents, such as those which have been cited in the case of Venezuela, are not available. The contem- porary historians, Alaman, Bustamente, and others, wrote their works some years afterward, when relations between Mexico and the United States had become embittered by numerous con- flicting interests and finally by war. Even so, the question of the Floridas received but little consideration at their hands. There was published, however, in 1821, at Philadelphia, a little volume under the title of Memoria Politico-Instructiva, which contains some indication of the Mexican point of view. It was distributed to the independent leaders in Mexico, and it was re- printed there in 1822. This book, published anonymously, has been attributed to Vicente Bocafuerte, a citizen of Ecuador, then, and for several years afterward, in the service of Mexico ; but every evidence points to Father Mier as author of the work. 73 Mier was, as has been pointed out in a previous chap- ter, one of the ablest and most influential Mexicans of his time. It will be of interest, therefore, to note his views on the cession of the Floridas. He, as did many others, regarded the neu- trality of the United States as purchased by Spain, the Floridas being ceded as a part of the consideration. " All the cessions," he declared, " are injuries to us, not only by virtue of the rights acquired from our mothers, all of whom were Indians, but by virtue of the pacts of our fathers, the conquistadores (who won all on their own account and at their own risk) with the Kings of Spain, who, according to the laws of the Indies, cannot under any condition whatever alienate the least part of America. And if they do, their act has no binding force." 74 And yet Mier was by no means unfriendly to the United States. He was an ardent republican and thought that the predictions often heard that the government of the United "The internal evidence points unmistakably to Padre Mier. See pp. 74-105, 127. Bustamente (Historia del Emperador Iturbide, 201) con- firms the authorship of Mier. 7* Memoria Politico-Instructiva, 15. Digitized by Microsoft® INTEKNATIONAL COMPLICATIONS 203 States would not survive were a sad consolation to royalists and had no basis in fact. " Why should we be compared," he inquired, " with the corrupt peoples of Europe, unacquainted with the virtues of republicanism, rather than with our com- patriots of the United States, among whom the republican form of government has had excellent results ? " The interests of Europe and America, he declared, were diverse. The counsels of the crowned heads of Europe should not be heeded, and es- pecially should England be distrusted. The philanthropy of British nationals should not be confused with the Machiavellian practices of the British ministry. Hiding her ambition under the veil of measures necessary to check the power of Napoleon, Great Britain, declared Mier, had proceeded with her system of seizing the strategic points in the waters of Europe, and she intended to follow the same practice in America. She was deeply wounded by the cession of the Floridas, which gave to the United States, the only power able to dispute her maritime supremacy, control of the Gulf of Mexico. The writer goes on to point out the places held in American waters by Great Britain — the Bermudas, the Bahamas, Jamaica, Trinidad, and other places which she had her eye upon. In the Guianas, she had a foothold on the continent of South America ; and she was show- ing a disposition to occupy the Isthmus of Panama, so that she might raise her trident in both seas. Moreover, in the southern continent, Brazil was, he said, little more than a British colony, and in that quarter Great Britain had acquired or was attempt- ing to acquire other points of vantage. In the northern con- tinent not only did she possess the Canadas, but she held the coast of Honduras, in New Spain, and she was going on extend- ing her dominion toward Yucatan. The British were so rooted in the country, said Mier, that the kings of the Mosquito nation received their authority at the hands of the governors of Ja- maica. It was not, therefore, Spain, their open enemy, with whom they had mainly to contend in order to be truly inde- Digitized by Microsoft® 204 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS pendent ; but another, more formidable, because hidden — the British ministry.. 75 Not only did the author of this Memoria regard the tendency of Great Britain to add to her possessions in America as of much greater consequence to the continent than any similar tendency manifested by the United States, but he was so far from being intolerant of the cession of the Floridas to the United States that he included in the appendix of his book an extract from the Letter of a. Patriot 7e in which that transac- tion was decidedly approved. The minister of his Catholic Majesty, said the writer of the letter, upon offering to the United States the Floridas — which were, and with reason, the object of their most ardent desires — demanded nothing less than an offensive and defensive alliance against the insurgents of South America and Mexico ; that is, he demanded that the government at Washington obligate itself to guarantee the in- tegrity of the Spanish dominions in America. Did the Spanish minister know, inquired the writer, that in putting forward this illegal, inhumane, scandalous proposition, he was placing the sword in the hands of the enemy ? The Americans, feeling aggrieved, presented the dilemma, either Spain would deliver the Eloridas in payment of the just claims against her, or the United States would occupy them by force and recognize the new governments. Spain could make but one choice. The Americans waited patiently and confidently and at the end of twenty months obtained the ratification of the treaty. Thus had the Floridas attained liberty. To-day they formed a part of the United States, and though sold, they escaped from the hu- miliating servitude and from the state of languor in which the mother country had held them for centuries. There occurred in the southern part of the continent also a number of incidents affecting the relations of the United States ™ Memoriw Politico-Instruotiva, 81, 90, 95. " Memoria PolUico-Iwttructwa, 140. The letter was published in full in the Correo del Orinoco early in 1820 and reprinted in Blanco-Azmirua VII, 446-449. F ' Digitized by Microsoft® INTEBNATIONAL COMPLICATIONS 205 with the belligerent colonies. One of these, involving in a singular manner the principle of neutrality, is briefly related by Barros Arana. 77 In 1813, during the war between Great Britain and the United States, the famous Am erican frigate, Essex, under the command of Captain David Porter, made a number of prizes in the southern Pacific, and arming and equip- ping one of them — at first the Georgians, later the Atlan- tic, rechristened the Essex Junior — sent it out to cruise under Lieutenant Downes. No less fortunate than his chief, Lieu- tenant Downes captured a number of enemy vessels, which he was ordered to take to Valparaiso and dispose of to the best advantage. The government of Chile, believing that the United States was resolved to aid the Spanish colonies to achieve their independence, placed no obstacles in the way of the disposal of the prizes. The Viceroy of Peru and the Spanish officials generally had attempted to convince the insurgents that the alliance between Spain and England against Napoleon extended to America and that England would help to reduce the rebellious colonies to obedience. It was not strange that this propaganda should have had effect in a country which, like Chile, was lo- cated at such a great distance from the sources of information. Poinsett's activities, referred to in the preceding chapter, doubt- less contributed also to the erroneous impression that assistance might be expected from the United States. Not only was Lieu- tenant Downes permitted, therefore, to dispose of the prizes, but the government itself manifested a disposition to acquire some of the vessels for the purpose of arming and equipping them as the beginning of the Chilean navy. This conduct of the government of Chile elicited from the junta at Buenos Aires a remonstrance, but expressed, says Barros Arana, in the most moderate and discreet terms it was possible to employ. The admission into the port of Valparaiso of an American war vessel with British prizes which had been permitted to be disposed of and sold in the country, declared the Buenos Aires junta, in- 77 Barros Arana, Historic Jeneral de Chile, IX, 220. Digitized by Microsoft® 206 PAN-AMEEICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS fringed the strict neutrality which should he maintained in the conflict between the two belligerents, England and the United States. In order that embarrassing consequences might be avoided, the junta suggested that reparation be made " to the satisfaction of the British commanders in these seas." Al- though it was thought in Chile that the commercial interests of the Buenos Aires Government might have prompted its action, most of the Chilean trade having been effected hitherto through Buenos Aires, yet the junta at Santiago, perceiving the danger of international complications, thereafter treated the Americans with greater reserve, maintaining as between them and the British strict neutrality. The friendly attitude of the Chilean Patriots on the one hand and the hostile attitude of the Spanish authorities on the other, toward the United States is reflected in the pages of Captain Porter's Journal. When he first entered the port of Valparaiso in the spring of 1813, he believed the Spanish to be in control ; and from the stand the United States had taken against British aggressions and from its conduct with respect to the Floridas he had no reason to expect a friendly reception. Before he cast his anchor, however, the captain of the port, accompanied by another officer, came on board with an offer of every civility, assistance, and accommodation that Valparaiso could afford. To his astonishment, Porter was informed that the country had shaken off its allegiance to Spain ; that the ports of Chile were open to all nations; that they looked up to the United States for example and protection; and that the arrival of the Amer- ican vessels would be regarded as most advantageous to their commerce, which had been much harassed by Koyalist corsairs from Peru. On shore, Captain Porter was given a very cordial reception by the governor. He found that he had happily got among stanch republicans, men filled with revolutionary princi- ples and apparently desirous of a form of government founded on liberty. As soon as his arrival was announced at Santiago, bells were rung the whole day and illuminations took place in Digitized by Microsoft® INTEKNATIONAL COMPLICATIONS 207 the evening. It was generally believed that the appearance of an American frigate in the Pacific signified nothing less than the offer of a friendly alliance and assistance in the struggle for in- dependence. The captain and his officers were invited to visit Santiago. He was told that the president with a large military escort would meet them on the road and accompany them to the city ; and he was assured that, from a political point of view, their coming was a most happy event. 78 But, said Captain Porter, time was too precious to be spent in amusements. Preparations for continuing the cruise went busily forward. And not until the vessel was ready for sea did the captain determine to devote a few hours to relaxation. He then invited the ladies and gentlemen of Valparaiso on board the Essex. As they were on the point of embarking, however, a strange vessel appeared in the offing. The guests were left on shore, and the officers returned on board, where everything was found prepared for getting under way. The cables were cut, and in an instant, as Captain Porter expresses it, the frigate was under a cloud of canvas. On board were Poinsett and Luis Carrera, together with other Americans and Chileans who had come down from Santiago to visit the ship. As there was every expectation of an engagement, they requested the privilege of sharing the dangers. Luis Carrera was the brother of the Chilean president, Jose Miguel Carrera. He was a spirited youth, says Captain Porter, and evidently anxious to take part in an engagement. His constant request was to board the stranger and his disappointment was great when she was discovered to be a Portuguese frigate. " We could per- ceive the hills," records Captain Porter in his Journal, " crowded with men, women, and children, all equally and per- haps more anxious than Don Luis to see the fight. Among them, as it afterward proved, were our fair guests, who did not hesitate to declare their disappointment; and frankly acknowl- edged that a sight of a sea engagement would have had more 78 Journal of a Cruise to the Pacific, I, 94, 97. Digitized by Microsoft® 208 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS charms for them than all the entertainments we could afford them on hoard the ship." Returning to port the American officers were given a dinner by order of, and at the expense of, the supreme government of Chile. There were present the officers of the Portuguese ship and some English merchants; " hut," says Captain Porter, " when the wine began to circu- late and the Chilean officers to feel the ardor of their patriotism, such flaming toasts were given as to make them think it prudent to retire." 79 Cruising along the coast of Peru, the Essex fell in with the Nereyda, a Spanish privateer out of Callao, and took possession of her, Captain Porter having discovered that she had been cruising for, and had captured, some American vessels. Her captain stated that as Spain and Great Britain were allies, he always respected the British flag; and that his sole object was the capture of American vessels. Captain Porter disarmed the privateer and, removing the American prisoners whom she had on board, sent her into the port of Callao with a letter to the viceroy, requesting that her captain be punished. At Tumbez, where the Essex touched a little later, Captain Porter found that the Royalist authorities there also were uncertain whether the war between Great Britain and the United States did not extend to the former's allies, the Spaniards. 80 In time, how- ever, the relationship of the several belligerents to each other was better understood. Captain Porter continued his cruise, temporarily breaking up British navigation in the Pacific. At last, in March, 1814, a superior British squadron under Com- modore Hillyar, composed of the frigate Phoebe and the sloop of war Cherub, appeared off the port of Valparaiso, where the Essex and the armed prize, Essex Junior, lay at anchor. Com- ing in and taking on provisions, the British vessels then cruised off the port for nearly six weeks, blockading the American ves- sels. Finally, the Essex attempted to escape, but becoming dis- '9 Journal of a Cruise to the Pacific, I, 100-102, so Ibid., I, 193, Digitized by Microsoft® INTERNATIONAL COMPLICATIONS 209 abled in a gale, put back into port and cast anchor in a small bay on the east side of the harbor, for the purpose of repairing damages. The enemy approached and here, in the territorial waters of Chile, the fierce battle, so well known to naval his- tory, was fought. The American vessels were compelled to surrender. 81 No claim for reparation was ever made nor does it appear to have been alleged that there was negligence on the part of the territorial sovereign in not preventing the attack. 82 As a result of the surrender of the Essex, the prestige of the Americans on the Pacific coast of South America suffered a decline. British influence was henceforth in the ascendant. Commodore Hillyar offered his services as mediator between the Royalist authorities at Lima and the revolutionary government of Chile. The Royalists accepted at once, and the Patriots, having suffered reverses, accepted somewhat later. The outlook for the revolution was dark not only in Chile but throughout the revolted provinces. As a result of Commodore Hillyar's media- tion, the Treaty of Lircay was concluded on May 3, 1814. By the terms of this treaty the Chileans recognized their dependence on the metropolis, but demanded and were promised an autono- mous national government. 83 Of the subsequent disapproval of the treaty by the viceroy at Lima, of the renewal of the war and of the complete reconquest of Chile, it does not concern us here to speak. Captain Porter and the survivors of his crew were sent under parole to the United States aboard the Essex Junior, which was disarmed and used as a cartel. Por the next four or five years relative quiet reigned on the Pacific coast. (With the renewal of the war, however, and the prepa- ration in 1819 of the expedition against Peru, the interests of the United States again became involved, through the opera- tion, as on so many other occasions, of the principle of neu- trality. 81 Journal of a Cruise to the Pacific, II, 161-168. 82 Moore, A Digest of International Law, VII, 1092. 83 Barros Arana, Historia Jeneral de Chile, IX, 416 et seq. Digitized by Microsoft® 210 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS Late in 1818, Lord Cochrane, it will be recalled, arrived in Chile to assume command of the naval forces of that republic. His presence there, as may well be inferred from his imperious character and from the fact that the feeling between Great Britain and the United States was still bitter, was not calculated to contribute to cordial relations between the Patriots and the Americans, who for one reason or another happened to visit that quarter. He had no sooner entered upon his duties than an acrid correspondence between him and Captain Biddle of the American sloop of war Ontario arose over the question of sa- lutes. 84 On March 1, 1819, acting under the authority of the Chilean Government, Cochrane issued a proclamation declaring the whole coast of Peru to be in a state of formal blockade. 85 His forces being insufficient to maintain an effective blockade of such a great stretch of coast, the United States held that it was illegal throughout its whole extent ; for otherwise, every capture under a notified blockade would be legal, because the capture itself would be proof of the blockading force. Lord Cochrane disavowed all claim of forfeiture as to any place where no ac- tual force was employed; but this disavowal was not wholly satisfactory 86 and numerous disagreeable incidents involving American ships and merchants occurred and continued to occur until the Royalists were finally driven out of Peru. A brief reference to the case of the Macedonian, an Ameri- can brig, taken by her captain, Eliphalet Smith, to trade on the Pacific coast in 1818, will illustrate the friction which arose. On September 23, 1818, the Supreme Director of Chile, in order to keep secret certain measures of a naval and military character, issued a decree declaring an embargo for one month upon all ships in the ports of the country. The Macedonian had been lying in the harbor of Valparaiso, but a few days before 8* Mies' Weekly Register, XVI, 204. 85 The proclamation was published in Niles' Weekly Register for July 3 1819, XVI, 318. 86 American State Papers, Naval Affairs, II, 557. Digitized by Microsoft® INTERNATIONAL COMPLICATIONS 211 the decree was issued put to sea and made for the port of Callao, arriving there early in October. Captain Smith, according to Barros Arana, was an unscrupulous adventurer who saw in the countries struggling for their independence nothing more than a field' for his speculations. He gave the viceroy all the information which he had been able to obtain in Chile, and offered to sail out to meet the Spanish squadron, which was expected in the Pacific, to warn it of the naval preparations which were going on in the ports of Chile. This offer was not accepted by the viceroy. Smith continued to traffic along the coast, serving the interests of the Royalists, says Barros Arana, and giving rise to diplomatic complications which were not set- tled for many years afterward. 87 When Lord Cochrane ap- peared before Callao, the Macedonian proceeded to Huarmey, a little port some twenty or thirty miles to the north. Near that place Cochrane's forces captured the sum of $80,000 which was being transported overland by Captain Smith under a small Royalist guard to be taken aboard the Macedonian. This sum, together with $60,000 taken by Cochrane from a French vessel and claimed by Captain Smith, as the proceeds of the sale of his cargo, was confiscated as enemy property, which it was alleged, Smith was attempting to smuggle out of the country. These two seizures were the subject of a negotiation between the United States and Chile in 1820, the Chilean gov- ernment agreeing to pay the sum of $104,000 with interest in full settlement of the claims. Two years later another large sum of money which Captain Smith claimed as the proceeds of a cargo brought by the Macedonian from China and sold to Royalist merchants at Arica was seized by Chilean forces, de- livered to Lord Cochrane, and distributed by him among his squadron. This seizure became the subject of a separate claim which the two governments agreed, in 1858, to submit to the King of Belgium for arbitration. By the award, which was not rendered until 1863, three-fifths of the claim, $42,400, that 87 Barros Arana, Historia Jeneral de Chile, XI, 634. Digitized by Microsoft® 212 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS proportion being owned by Smith and his American associates, was allowed. The Macedonian was the cause of still another claim against Peru. After the Patriots came into control of the government at Lima, Captain Smith took his vessel to Callao to dispose of the residue of the cargo brought from China. The brig was now seized and condemned as the property of Spanish refugees. By the terms of a convention entered into in 1841 between the United States and Peru the latter agreed to pay the United States the sum of $300,000 in full satisfaction of all its claims; and of this sum nearly one-third was apportioned on account of the Macedonian.* 8 It would appear from the settlement of the various claims growing out of the trading of the Macedonian in Peru, that Cap- tain Smith, in so far as these particular incidents were con- cerned, was guilty of no offense under international law. Apart from his trading activities, however, the Patriots believed him to be in sympathy with the Royalists, and actively engaged in promoting their interests. This charge was never the subject of judicial investigation, as were the claims. But, whatever may have been the truth of the matter, the conduct of Captain Smith, supported in so far as it was legal, by the government at Washington, contributed, together with other incidents of a similar sort, not a little to the dimming of the earlier impression of the Patriots that the United States would be, in the struggle, their friend and ally. The Macedonian was only one of a number of American ves- sels trading with the Royalists in defiance of the so-called block- ade. After Lord Cochrane returned to Chile in 1822, the Peruvian navy was organized and for the next two or three years thereafter attempted to prevent intercourse with the enemy. The United States maintained a squadron in Peruvian waters during this period and its commander, in looking out for 88 Moore, History and Digest of International Arbitrations, II, 1451 et seq.; V, 4602. Digitized by Microsoft® INTERNATIONAL COMPLICATIONS 213 the interests of American shipping, incurred the ill •will of the Patriot government. The Peruvian historian, Paz Soldan, de- clares that " the decided and vituperable partiality " of Captain Stewart of the IT. S. S. Franklin aided the viceroy in keeping informed of the movements of the Patriots ; that under the guns of the Franklm arms and ammunition were debarked at Arica for the Royalists ; that the government of Peru asked in vain to have Captain Stewart relieved ; that during the South American struggle for independence the United States gave more than one proof of its protection to Spain and of its lack of interest in the political fortunes of the former Spanish colonies ; and that Great Britain pursued a wholly different course. 89 The contrast, suggested by Paz Soldan, between the attitude of the United States and that of Great Britain toward the strug- gle of the Spanish Am erican colonies to achieve independence demands a word of consideration. Both governments professed a policy of strict neutrality. The United States, as has been pointed out, in order better to comply with its neutral duty, passed the Act of March 3, 1817. This law was declared by Clay and his partisans to be " anti-neutral " and this character- ization was widely copied throughout Spanish America, often with the implication that British legislation was more favorable to the insurgents. But the Foreign Enlistment Act, passed by 89 Historia del Peril Independiente, II, 115. Captain Stewart was recalled and tried by court-martial in 1824. In a letter to him dated November 16, 1824, the Secretary of the Navy said: " You have been already apprised that the government of Peru has made complaints against a part of your official conduct, while in command of the squadron in the Pacific Ocean, and that these complaints have been seconded by public rumor, and confirmed by the agent of our government in that country. I have, also, to inform you that other complaints have been made, though in a less imposing form." Captain Stewart was tried under the following charges : Unofficerlike conduct, disobedience of orders, neglect of duty, and oppression and cruelty. Under the first charge there were twenty-nine separate specifications, most of which set forth alleged un- neutral conduct on the part of the accused. By the judgment of the court- martial, Captain Stewart was acquitted most honorably of all the charges which had been made against him. The record of the trial is found in American State Papers, Naval Affairs, II, 487-597. Digitized by Microsoft® 214 PAN-AMEPJCANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS Parliament in 1819, was avowedly based on the American Act of 1817 as amended in 1818. Prior to the enactment of this law, Great Britain had attempted to enforce neutrality under the provisions of international law. But violations were fre- quent. In 1818 alone six expeditions are said to have been dispatched by Lopez Mendez to Venezuela, One of these, a brigade under Colonel English, consisted of some two thousand men. Even subsequent to the passage of the Foreign Enlistment Act, General D'Evereux, after an elaborate public banquet in Dublin, took out another expedition to South America. 90 Out of these illicit expeditions grew the British Legion which served under Bolivar and which, in conjunction with the native troops, played a decisive part in the liberation of the northern part of South America. 91 Eor this assistance, however, and for the invaluable aid rendered in the south by Cochrane, Miller, and others, whose services were enlisted in England, no credit can be given to the British Government without con- victing it of a shameless disregard for its own laws and of duplicity toward one of the parties to the contest. It was a question of individual enterprise. That citizens of the United States played no such part was due not at all to lack of sym- pathy with the cause, but to a stricter enforcement of the Amer- ican neutrality laws and to the circumstance that the relatively small number of adventurous spirits who might have been drawn into the contest found agreeable occupation at home. The country was new. Savage tribes on the frontiers had to be subdued. Vast tracts of unoccupied territory called for settlers. Industry and commerce flourished. In Great Britain the situ- ation was altogether different. The conclusion of the Euro- pean wars turned many thousands back to peaceful pursuits. A period of industrial distress and of unemployment followed. Emigration set out for foreign shores. The countries of Cen- tral and South America, struggling to be free, offered promis- 90 Paxson, The Independence of the South American Republics 126 »i O'Leary, Memoriae, XVII, 571; XVIII, 80. Digitized by Microsoft® INTEKNATIONAL COMPLICATIONS 215 ing rewards to those bred to arms. To these causes and not to governmental policy was due the relatively large con- tribution of British subjects to the emancipation of Spanish America. Although the British Government and that of the United States were in substantial accord on the subject of neutrality, yet, as to the question of the independence of the colonies, they differed widely. The United States, while maintaining neu- trality, did not hesitate to express its sympathy with the cause of independence, and was never in the least inclined to con- tribute to any arrangement for reestablishing the authority of the mother country. Great Britain, on the contrary, made several attempts to bring about a reconciliation between the in- surgents and the Peninsular authorities on the basis of the supremacy of the latter, and not until the United States had formally recognized the new states did the British Government finally give up hope of accomplishing such a result. The first of these attempts was made in 1810 at the solicitation of a Venezuelan delegation headed by Bolivar. In a memorandum on the subject, Marquess Wellesley concluded that by a skillful use of Ferdinand's title as sovereign — the insurgents still pro- fessed loyalty to him — it would be possible for England to pre- vent a sudden and complete emancipation of the Spanish col- onies and yet compel Spain to modify her colonial system; but that it was chimerical to suppose that the mother country could preserve her colonies otherwise than as allied states under a common sovereign. The regency at Cadiz, however, declined to enter into negotiations upon such a basis and no further effort was made for the time to bring about the desired reconcili- ation. 92 In May, 1811, the British diplomatic representative at Cadiz was instructed to renew and urge the offer of mediation of Great Britain for the purpose of checking the progress of the unfor- tunate civil war and of effecting at least such a temporary ad- »2 Satow, Diplomatic Practice, II, 335-337. Digitized by Microsoft® 216 PAN-AMEKICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS justment as might prevent, during the contest with France, so ruinous a waste of the general strength of the Spanish Em- pire. " Heads of Articles of Adjustment " were drawn up as a basis for the proposed mediation. The provisions were in substance for a cessation of hostilities; a general amnesty; representation of the colonies in the Cortes; free trade with preference for Old Spain and her colonies; native Americans to be viceroys or governors ; native representation in the cabildos and no appeals to Spain; and cooperation in the war against France. The articles were to be guaranteed by Great Britain. But it was understood that the British Government would not be induced to commit acts of hostility against the colonies on the ground of a refusal to recognize the constituted authorities in the Peninsula, because such a course would merely drive them into the arms of the enemy. The mediation was not pro- posed by Great Britain for her own benefit, it was declared, but in order to reconcile the colonies with the mother country and maintain the integrity of the Spanish monarchy. This attempt having failed because of Spain's insistence on the help of Great Britain to resubjugate the colonies in case the mediation failed, negotiations were once more renewed, in 1812, on the occasion of the election of a new regency. But Spain remained obdurate and no agreement was reached. The reestablishment of Spanish authority in Chile in 1814 through the mediation of Commo- dore Hillyar has been referred to above. And in a previous chapter attention has been called to the treaty of July 5, 1814, between Great Britain and Spain, in which his Britannic Ma- jesty, being anxious that the insurgents " should return to their obedience to their lawful sovereign," engaged to prevent his subjects from furnishing them " arms, ammunition, or any other warlike article." In 1815 Spain asked for the mediation of Great Britain, but refused to state the terms to which she was willing to agree. In 1818, at Aix-la-Chapelle, the question of an arrangement between Spain and her colonies was discussed by the five great powers. The British attitude continued to Digitized by Microsoft® INTERNATIONAL COMPLICATIONS 217 be that they could only mediate and facilitate and not compel or menace. But not even an approximation of opinion was reached. 93 As Great Britain consistently refused to intervene by force to resubjugate the Spanish colonies, and as revolutionary prin- ciples showed a constant tendency to spread in Europe as well as in America, the allied sovereigns of Russia, Prussia, Austria, and France resolved to take the matter in hand. At the Con- gress of Verona, in 1822, they agreed to restore, through the arms of France, the absolute power of Ferdinand VII, of which he had been deprived by a movement setting up a liberal gov- ernment under the Spanish Constitution of 1820. This stand of their allies brought the British cabinet to a realization of the hopelessness of further attempts to mediate between the parties to the conflict in America, on the basis of the supremacy of the mother country. Moreover the government at Washington had just recognized the independence of the new states. The line of cleavage between liberal America and absolutist Europe was now clearly drawn. It was necessary for Great Britain to take her position definitively on one side or the other. At the Con- gress of Verona the British representatives had opposed the hostile intentions of the allies, and on April 14, 1822, Canning, who had succeeded Castlereagh as Secretary for Foreign Affairs, made a declaration on the subject in the House of Commons. 94 With regard to the Spanish possessions in America, he said, there was no choice. As long as peace continued and Spain had no enemies in Europe, Great Britain was free to determine how far she could intervene in the contest in America. The situation, however, had changed. Spain had acquired a power- ful and active enemy in Europe and it had become necessary for England to declare her views on the struggle of the colonies MIbid., 340-350. 9 * The papers relating to the subject were given to the press. On July 20, 1823, the Gaceta de Colombia published an article based on an account in the Jamaica Courant, containing the substance of Canning's declaration. Digitized by Microsoft® 218 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS for independence. As France might send fleets and armies to conquer and take possession of them, and as at the termination of the war a settlement might be made transferring some of them to France, Great Britain felt obliged to declare that she considered the separation of the Spanish colonies had reached such a point that she could not tolerate the cession of them to any other power. In spite of the British attitude, the Holy Alliance persisted in its plans. The French army, which early in 1823 invaded Spain, soon accomplished its mission. Apprehensions were aroused in both Great Britain and the United States. It was stated and generally believed that the plan was the reestablish- ment of Spanish authority over all the American possessions, except Mexico and California, which were to be ceded to France and Russia, respectively, in consideration of the military aid to be rendered to Spain by these two powers in the work of res- toration. 95 Toward the latter part of August, 1823, Canning sounded Rush, the United States minister at London, as to whether the two governments might not come to an understand- ing on the subject of the Spanish American colonies, and as to whether it would not be expedient for themselves and bene- ficial for the world that its principles should be clearly settled and plainly avowed. The British Government, he added, con- sidered the recovery of the colonies by Spain to be hopeless, and the question of recognizing their independence to be one of time and circumstances, but were not disposed to put any im- pediment in the way of a settlement by amicable negotiation. Disclaiming any selfish aim on the part of his government, he declared, finally, that Great Britain could not see with indiffer- ence the transfer of any portion of them to any other power. Eush, not being authorized to enter into such an agreement, communicated the substance of the conversation to the Secre- tary of State at Washington. 96 The circumstances which fol- 95 Burgess, The Middle Period, 124. Oaceta de Colombia, July 13, 1823. 86 Satow, Diplomatic Practice, II, 353. Digitized by Microsoft® INTERNATIONAL COMPLICATIONS 219 lowed and which led up to the famous declaration contained in Monroe's message of December 2, 1823, are well known. Without waiting for the decision of the United States, Can- ning declared in an interview with Prince de Polignac, on Oc- tober 9, that in the conflict between Spain and her colonies Great Britain would remain neutral; but that, if any foreign power joined with Spain against the colonies, an entirely new question would be created upon which Great Britain must take such decision as her interests might require. 97 In January following, Canning declared that, in the opinion of the British Government, it was vain to hope that any mediation not founded on the basis of independence could be successful, but if the court of Madrid desired it, they would willingly afford their countenance and aid to a negotiation commenced on the only basis which then appeared to be practicable, and would see with- out reluctance, the conclusion, through a negotiation on that basis, of an arrangement by which the mother country should be secured in the enjoyment of commercial advantages superior to those conceded to other nations. 98 A year later Great Britain recognized the independence of the new states, but she continued her efforts, as will be seen in a subsequent chapter on the Pan- ama Congress, to mediate in favor of a settlement of the con- flict on the basis of certain pecuniary advantages to the mother country. It is not proposed to give a resume of the history of the Monroe Doctrine. Numerous histories of it have been written and many able minds have been devoted to the analysis of its provisions. Relatively little, however, has been published in English on the subject from the standpoint of Hispanic Amer- ica. Accordingly, in the next chapter, an effort will be made to determine from contemporaneous sources the attitude which the new states assumed toward the declaration at the time of its promulgation. For reference the paragraphs of Monroe's mes- 9f Moore, Principles of American Diplomacy, 243. w Satow, Diplomatic Practice, II, 363. Digitized by Microsoft® 220 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS sage commonly accepted as constituting the basis of the doc- trine are given below. They cannot be too often read. In the first part of the message, referring to an attempt which was being made to arrange by amicable negotiation with the Russian Government the rights and interests of the two na- tions on the northwest coast, President Monroe said : " In the discussions to which this interest has given rise and in the arrangement by which they may terminate the occasion has been judged proper for asserting, as a principle in which the rights and interests of the United States are involved, that the American continents, by the free and independent condition which they have assumed and maintain, are henceforth not to be considered as subjects for future colonization by any European powers." Toward the end of the message, Monroe refers to events in Spain and Portugal and continues as follows : " Of events in that quarter of the globe, with which we have so much intercourse and from which we derive our origin, we have always been anxious and interested spectators. The citi- zens of the United States cherish sentiments the most friendly in favor of the liberty and happiness of their fellow men on that side of the Atlantic. In the wars of the European powers in matters relating to themselves we have never taken any part, nor does it comport with our policy so to do. It is only when our rights are invaded or seriously menaced that we resent in- juries or make preparation for our defense. With the move- ments in this hemisphere we are of necessity more immediately connected, and by causes which must be obvious to all enlight- ened and impartial observers. The political system of the allied powers is essentially different in this respect from that of America. This difference proceeds from that which exists in their respective governments; and to the defense of our own, which has been achieved by the loss of so much blood and treas- ure, and matured by the wisdom of their most enlightened citi- zens, and under which we have enjoyed unexampled felicity, Digitized by Microsoft® INTEKNATIONAL COMPLICATIONS 221 this whole nation is devoted. We owe it, therefore, to candor and to the amicable relations existing between the United States and those powers to declare that we should consider any attempt on their part to extend their system to any portion of this hemi- sphere as dangerous to our peace and safety. With the exist- ing colonies or dependencies of any European power we have not interfered and shall not interfere. But with the governments who have declared their independence and main- tained it, and whose independence we have, on great con- sideration and on just principles, acknowledged, we could not view any interposition for the purpose of oppressing them, or controlling in any other manner their destiny, by any Euro- pean power in any other light than as the manifestation of an unfriendly disposition toward the United States. In the war between those new governments and Spain we declared our neu- trality at the time of their recognition, and to this we have adhered, and shall continue to adhere, provided no change shall occur which, in the judgment of the competent authorities of this government, shall make a corresponding change on the part of the United States indispensable to their security. " The late events in Spain and Portugal show that Europe is still unsettled. Of this important fact no stronger proof can be adduced than that the allied powers should have thought it proper, on any principle satisfactory to themselves, to have interposed by force in the internal concerns of Spain. To what extent such interposition may be carried, on the same principle, is a question in which all independent powers whose governments differ from theirs are interested, even those most remote, and surely none more so than the United States. Our policy in regard to Europe, which was adopted at an early stage of the wars which have so long agitated that quarter of the globe, nevertheless remains the same, which is, not to interfere in the internal concerns of any of its powers; to consider the government de facto as the legitimate government for us; to cultivate friendly relations with it and to preserve those rela- Digitized by Microsoft® 222 PAN-AMERICANISM : ITS BEGINNINGS tions by a frank, firm, and manly policy, meeting in all in- stances the just claims of every power, submitting to injuries from none. But in regard to these continents circumstances are eminently and conspicuously different. It is impossible that the allied powers should extend their political system to any portion of either continent without endangering our peace and happiness; nor can any one believe that our southern brethren, if left to themselves, would adopt it of their own ac- cord. It is equally impossible, therefore, that we should behold such interposition in any form with indifference. If we look to the comparative strength and resources of Spain and those new governments and their distance from each other, it must be obvious that she can never subdue them. It is still the true policy of the United States to leave the parties to themselves, in the hope that other powers will pursue the same course." " so Monroe, Writings, VI, 339. Digitized by Microsoft® OHAPTEE VI HISPANIC AMERICA AND THE MONROE DOCTRINE It is important to keep in mind the fact that the former col- onies of Spain, and to a greater or less extent Brazil also, dur- ing their struggle for independence and for some years after- ward had their gaze constantly fixed on Europe. From that source would come, they feared, the forces which might succeed in subjecting them again to the hated authority of the mother country; and from that source also they hoped to receive the succor which would complete their independence and protect them in the continuous enjoyment of it. Mexico and Central America, after their disastrous experience as an empire, frankly accepted the republican system ; but not for this reason did they cease to rely upon European and especially upon British assist- ance to fix their independence. Argentina, and to a less de- gree Chile, continued throughout the revolutionary period to look to Europe for a solution of their political problems. The Bolivarian republics — that is, Great Colombia, Peru, and Bo- livia — although they achieved their emancipation mainly through their own efforts under the leadership of the Liberator, yet had received material aid from Great Britain and expected from her protection against reconquest by the allied powers of Europe. Brazil, likewise, owing to the peculiar relation exist- ing between Portugal and Great Britain,' was indebted to Brit- ish influence in great part for the relative ease with which her independence was effected, and for the prospect of being able to live in undisturbed exercise of sovereignty over her vast territory. Great Britain, in fact, had become strongly intrenched in the affections of the new American states. She, more than any 323 Digitized by Microsoft® 224 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS other foreign power, had contributed to their independence. From her shores, regardless of treaty obligations, and the obli- gations of international law, armed expeditions had sailed to aid the revolted colonists ; in her ports ships had been fitted out to form units in the insurgent navies or to operate as privateers against Spanish commerce; from her citizens loans had been obtained and by them military supplies had been furnished; and on British soil thousands of men had been enlisted to serve in the revolutionary ranks. Moreover the prestige which Great Britain had acquired through the part she had played in the overthrow of Napoleon, together with her gradual withdrawal from the trammels of the allied powers of Europe, and finally her stand against the intervention of those powers in American affairs, tended very much to enhance friendly relations be- tween her and the American beneficiaries of her policy, and to cause them to rely more strongly upon British protection. 1 The United States on the other hand enforced its neutrality laws with relative strictness and thus contributed much less in a material way to the outcome of the revolution than did Great Britain. And, as the military and naval strength of the United States was considerably inferior to that of Great Britain, it is not surprising that of the two nations that stood between the Hispanic American states and the Holy Alliance, i During the greater part of the period of revolution in Hispanic Amer- ica the interests of Great Britain were looked after by British naval offi- cers, but special agents were later sent out and to their activities, no doubt, the good disposition toward England can in large measure be attributed. The following from a letter of Naval Lieutenant Samouel, an agent whom France sent to Mexico early in 1824 to effect a reconciliation between that republic and Spain is significant. Writing to the Minister of Marine and Colonies from Habana under date of August 14, 1824, he says : " I made strong efforts to destroy the lack of confidence with respect to the intentions of France, who is thought to be supporting King Ferdinand, and on all sides I noted great animosity toward the Spaniards, who are quite numerous in that province. Spain is considered as incapable of carrying out any undertaking unless she is aided by some power of the Continent, and the English have given out the information that if this should occur they would give Mexico strong support." — Villanueva, La Santa Alianza, 38, 283. Digitized by Microsoft® THE MONROE DOCTRINE 225 Great Britain should have occupied by far the more prominent place in the opinion of those states. Striking illustrations of this fact are to be found in the manner in which the new states received the Monroe declaration. News of President Monroe's message of December 2, 1823, apparently did not arrive in the City of Mexico until near the middle of the following February. The first direct reference to the message in the press of the Mexican capital occurs in the Aguila Mexicana 2 of February 12, 1824, when the following brief notice appeared : "A person who left New Orleans on the fifteenth of last month says that the message of the President of the United States of North America containing a declara- tion with regard to maintaining the independence of Mexico and South America was received with the greatest approval and satisfaction ; and that though the President insinuates that no intervention would be called for in case Spain alone under- took the reconquest of her colonies, nevertheless it is said the states of the West are determined to oppose reconquest under whatever circumstances and to assist in any way they may be able to defend the United Mexican states." 3 Several days later the Aguila Mexicana received a letter and newspapers from a correspondent writing from Habana under date of January 15. This correspondent discussed the interna- tional situation in such a way as to indicate that he had read the Monroe declaration, though he made no direct reference to it. He expressed the opinion that England and the United States would oppose foreign intervention in the affairs of the American states, but he believed that their action would be limited to opposition to what he called ostensible intervention, which would not prevent aid being given Spain through loans. He was of the opinion, therefore, that it was best for the Amer- 2 This paper, the first daily to be published in Mexico, was the organ of the Federalist group of the Republican party. The Centralists depended upon El Sol to defend their interests. The Federalists were in power at this time. — Zavala, Ensayo Histdrico, I, 256. 3 Aguila Mexicana, February 12, 1824. Digitized by Microsoft® 226 PAN-AMEEICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS ican states to trust to their own resources and not to rely too much on foreign protection. 4 Among the papers received from the Habana correspondent there must have been one or more which contained either ex- tracts from Monroe's message or possibly the message in full; for in the same issue of the Aguila Mexicana in which this correspondent's letter was inserted there was published a lead- ing article entitled " Politica," which embodied a short extract from that famous document. It is worthy of note that on this occasion, when the declaration of President Monroe might have been expected to arouse the liveliest interest, another question which in the mind of the editor was of much greater impor- tance; namely, the recognition of Mexican independence by Great Britain and the establishment of diplomatic relations be- tween the two countries, received the paper's chief attention, while the declaration of President Monroe was treated as purely incidental to that question. The author of the article, declar- ing that the British cabinet was in favor of the independence of Mexico, expressed the opinion that with England on their side the goal was already practically attained; for Spain in her weakness would be obliged to heed the least intimation of that great power. A favorable circumstance, he added, was the fact that the United States, naturally the friend of Mexico, had come to its aid in accord with the only nation capable of commanding respect in case opposition of interests should arise. Then to make clear the position of the United States an extract from that part of Monroe's message referring to the noninter- vention of Europe in the affairs of the American states was given ; but this was followed by no comment. 8 In the course of a review of the year 1824, El Sol, another daily of Mexico City, though not referring to Monroe's mes- sage, "makes the following significant observations : " The termination of the war in Spain we believe turned the attention *Ilid., February 26, 1824. o Ibid. Digitized by Microsoft® THE MONROE DOCTRINE 227 of the powers of Europe to independent America. The despot Ferdinand as soon as he saw himself reestablished in what he oalls his rights, solicited the aid of his allies for the purpose of restoring his authority on this side of the Atlantic. To this end he proposed the convocation of a congress in the expecta- tion that one of those reunions in which the sovereigns of Eu- rope conspire against the liberties of the people would resolve upon the oppression of the Americas. In this he was disap- pointed, for the firm, constant, liberal conduct of the British Government prevented such a congress from meeting, and the positive declarations of that government closed the door to the idea of aggression by other arms than those of Spain. More- over the power of a nation in a state of dissolution and anarchy, such as that in which Spain finds herself, is to be but little feared. Thus it is that though our independence has not been recognized it has been respected." 6 The foregoing expressions, unofficial though they are, never- theless undoubtedly make manifest in a fairly exact way the relative importance which was attached in Mexico to the Monroe Doctrine at the time of its proclamation. Fortunately, how- ever, a more authoritative statement is at hand. In a report which the Minister of Foreign Relations, Don Lucas Alaman, 7 6 El Sol, January 2, 1825. i Lucas Alaman was born in Guanajuato, Mexico, in 1792. He received his early education in the city of his birth, and afterward continued his studies in Mexico City and in Europe, where he remained from 1814 to 1820. During these years he traveled over the greater part of Great Britain and the Continent, perfecting himself in moden languages and pur- suing studies in the natural sciences. On his return to Mexico he was elected deputy to the Spanish Cortes for the province of Guanajuato and thenceforth he occupied a prominent place in Mexican history. Returning once more to Mexico in March, 1823, he was shortly afterward made Minister of Foreign Affairs and with the exception of short intervals served in that office until the end of 1825, after which he retired to private life. At various times subsequently, however, he held high office in the republic and at the time of his death in 1853 he was once more occupying the post of Minister of Foreign Affairs. Alamfin's Historia de Mexico (5 vols.) is perhaps the most reliable and satisfactory history that has yet been written of the Republic of Mexico. This work was preceded by his Disertaoiones sobre la Mstoria de la Digitized by Microsoft® 228 PAN-AMEKICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS made to the Mexican Congress on January 11, 1825, he men- tions, in discussing the state of affairs in Europe, the message of President Monroe. This he does in such a connection as to leave little doubt as to his estimate of its relative importance. Speaking of the invasion of Spain by France and of the desire of Ferdinand to secure the intervention of the Holy Alliance in his favor, Alaman says : " This conduct of the Spanish Government has given an entirely new direction to European policy. England refused Ferdinand's invitation to join in the proposed congress, and the papers presented by the English minister to Parliament, which were published, set forth with admirable frankness the liberal principles which were to guide her conduct. While not opposing the recognition of our inde- pendence England desired that Spain should be the first of the European powers to take this important step, though she has indicated that the circumstances are such that she will not wait very long for the results of Spain's tortuous procedure, and she has openly declared that she will not permit any power or league of powers to undertake armed intervention in favor of Spain in the pending questions with her former colonies. Very similar also was the resolution announced by the Presi- dent of the United States of the North as set forth in his mes- sage presented to a former Congress. And as the French Gov- ernment at about the same time manifested friendly intentions toward us there are very strong reasons for believing that the moment for the recognition of our independence by other Eu- ropean nations is at hand." 8 RepuoUca Mexicana desde la Conquista hastkt la Independencia, forming in effect an introduction to the former. Alamftn possessed ability of a high order, and he cultivated it with industry. He spoke English, French, and Italian fluently. He not infrequently displayed leanings toward monarchy, though he himself declared that his experience, in Europe had converted him to republican principles. — Bancroft, History of Mexico, IV, 823 ; Bocanegra, Hist, de Mex., 241, 557, 574; Apuntes para la Biografia del Exmo. Br. D. Lucas Alamdn. 8 Memoria presentada a las dos Odmaras del Oongreso General de la Federaeidn ul aorirse las Sesiones del Afto de 1825, 4. See also British and Foreign State Papers, XII, 983. Digitized by Microsoft® THE MONROE DOCTRINE 229 As it is desired at this point merely to determine the imme- diate effect produced throughout Latin America by the message of President Monroe, but little importance will be attached to views expressed long posterior to that event. It is worth not- ing, however, that Alaman in his Historia de Mexico, published about a quarter of a century later, found no reason to give a more important place in Mexican history to the Monroe Doc- trine than he had ascribed to it in the report referred to above. Indeed the pages of his work may be searched in vain for any reference whatever to the Monroe declaration, whereas along with a brief notice of the recognition of the independence of Mexico by the United States, the author gives a relatively full account of the attitude of Great Britain respecting recognition and the opposition of that power to the interference of the Holy Alliance in American affairs. 9 Other Mexican historians, contemporaries of Alaman, in like manner attached relatively less importance to the policy of Monroe than to that of Canning. Tornel, 10 in his Breve- Besefia Historica, affirms that if the United States had been content with exercising the supremacy to which every circumstance called her, or if she had been satisfied with laying the founda- tions for an American continental system, she would have met the expectations of the world and she would not have been re- proached with having proceeded with selfish motives, rather than with the noble purpose of leading, counseling, and de- fending the American nations in their tempestuous infancy. Reviewing in detail the conduct of Great Britain in her rela- tions to the continental system and to the Western Hemisphere, the author concludes by saying that the words of Canning to the effect that he had called a new world into existence, were 9 Alamfin, Hist, de Mex., V, 815-818. 10 General Josi Maria Tornel was a firm supporter of Santa Anna. He was twice appointed as Minister of War and on one occasion represented Mexico at Washington. He died in 1853, leaving his Resena Hist&rica incomplete. Bancroft, Hist, of Mexico, V, 254; Bocanegra, Hist, de Mex., II, 577. Digitized by Microsoft® 230 PAN-AMEKICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS in the nature of a boast for which he could be excused out of gratitude for the immense benefit conferred upon the American states by England in disconcerting the designs of the Holy Alli- ance. In this respect they had been favored also, he admits, by the United States, who opposed with energy and firmness the interposition of the powers of Europe in the affairs of the New World. 11 Bocanegra, in his Memorias para la Historia de Mexico In- dependiente, referring to the arrival at Vera Cruz in December, 1823, of a commission which the British Government had sent to Mexico to report on its political condition, says that this event was made much of on account of the prevailing conviction that recognition by Great Britain was essential to the conserva- tion of the independence of the republic. 12 In May, 1824, news reached Mexico of certain conferences which Canning had held with the Erench ambassador at London, and in which Canning had declared in substance that he believed it to be useless for Spain to try longer to recover her colonies, and that if she insisted on making the effort England would not permit any other power to aid in the reconquest. In virtue of this stand, the fame of Canning, Bocanegra declares, spread throughout America, and in Mexico he was looked upon as the great champion of natural rights and of the independence of the Mexican nation. 18 From this writer President Monroe received no such praise as was given the " immortal Canning." Indeed the only reference to Monroe or to his doctrine to be found in Bocanegra's history is contained in a short discourse spoken by the minister of the United States, Poinsett, upon his reception by President Victoria on June 2, 1825. Vic- ii Breve Besefla Histdrica de los Acontecimientos m&s notables de la Naci&n, Mexicana, 31-32. 12 Jose Maria Bocanegra was for a short time provisional president of the republic. In 1829, 1837, and 1841-1844 he served as Minister of Foreign Relations. He died in 1862 without having published his Memorias. They were not published until 1892, when an official edition appeared under the direction of J. M. Vigil. is II, 288. Digitized by Microsoft® THE MONROE DOCTRINE 231 toria, however, in his reply made no reciprocal reference to the Monroe declaration. 14 To cite opinions formed after the annexation of Texas and after the War of 18-17 between Mexico and the United States had embittered the relations between the two countries, would not contribute to the aims of this chapter. Although the works of Alaman, Tornel, and Bocanegra were not published until toward the middle of the century or later, yet they appear to reflect faithfully the early attitude. This is confirmed by an- other Mexican author, Lorenzo Zavala, 16 whose sympathies were decidedly favorable to the people and to the institutions of the United States and whose work was published in 1831, at which time no serious friction had yet arisen between Mex- ico and the United States. " It is evident,' ' says Zavala, " that if it had not been for the forceful declarations of the governments of England and of the United States to the effect that they would not permit Spain to receive aid from any of the powers in her attempts to recover her colonies, France would have done in America, or at least would have attempted to do, what she had just ac- complished in the Peninsula. At that time the propaganda of the Holy Alliance was altogether in Spain's favor. The undertakings in Xaples, in the Piedmont, and in Spain ap- "II, 381-382. is Lorenzo de Zavala was born in Merida, Yucatan, in 1781. In 1820 he was elected deputy to the Spanish Cortes and later served as deputy and ihen senator in the Mexican Congress. From 1827-1830 he was governor of the State of Mexico. Upon the downfall of Guerrero in December, 1829, Zavala left Mexico and traveled in-the United States and Europe. Return- ing in 1833 he was again elected to Congress, serving also as governor of Mexico. In the following year he was appointed minister to France but resigned upon perceiving the direction toward centralism of the party in power in Mexico, and cast his lot with the Texans. He was a member of the convention which declared the independence of Texas, March 2, 1836, and was elected vice-president of that republic. He died in November of the same year. His Ensayo Hist6rico de las Bevoluciones de Mexico (2 vols.) was first published at Paris in 1831. There he also published in 1834 his Viaje a los Estados Vnidos del Sorte de America, Bancroft, Hist, of ilex., V, 87; Xorth Mexican States and Texas, II, 218. Wooten, A Comprehensive History of Texas, I, 238. Alaman, Hist, de ilex., V, 576. Digitized by Microsoft® 232 PAN-AMEKICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS peared to encourage the Holy Alliance in its crusade against the Americans, who, according to the phrase employed, were rebels against their legitimate sovereign. If it had not been for Eng- land and the United States the seas would have been covered with embarkations bearing new conquistadores to America. The language of Canning, though somewhat pompous and in- flated, had nevertheless the positive effect of prohibiting the intervention of any other power in transatlantic affairs." 10 Then, referring to the famous speech of Canning, made in the House of Commons on December 12, 1826, on which occasion he boasted that he had called a new world into existence, Zavala declares that the language was poetic and exaggerated; but that it could not be doubted that though Canning did not give existence enable Ferdinand VII to undertake the reconquest of his former polonies. The French Generalis- simo proclaimed this to be the object of his august uncle. Eng- land has the- credit of flying to the assistance of reason, justice >» British and Foreign State Papers, XII, 875, 884, 963. Digitized by Microsoft® 234 PAN-AMEEICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS and liberty, and of rescuing America from the disasters of war, by the interposition of her Trident. 20 This eventful circum- stance has opened the means of communication between the two worlds ; and Mexico, blessed by the inexhaustible resources of its soil, occupies a high station in the new order of things." 21 After rapidly reviewing the relations of the United Mexican states with the other powers of Europe, President Victoria passed to a consideration of the relations with the nations of this hemisphere. " Justice and gratitude," he said, " compel us to mention, before all others, the most ancient State of Amer- ica, and the first of the Civilized World which solemnly pro- claimed our rights, after having preceded us in the heroick resolution of shaking off a dependence on the Mother Country. The United States of the North, models of political virtue and 20 Victoria's evident partiality for Great Britain did not pass unnoticed in the United States. William Cabell Rives of Virginia, speaking in the House of Eepresentatives, April 6, 1826, on a resolution which he had introduced respecting the proposed mission to Panama adverted to the partiality of President Victoria for Great Britain. " I have already briefly alluded," he said, " to the various offices of kindness, and manifesta- tions of friendship, which we have exhibited towards these people. With what return have they ever met? Let any gentleman read the late message of the President of Mexico to his congress, and then let his feelings of mortified and indignant pride give the answer. Sir, we have vainly imagined that by the acts of disinterested friendship, and the solid and useful services we have rendered our southern neighbors, we had won their gratitude and confidence; that they looked up to us as their patron and guide, and regarded us with filial reverence — to use the language of a gentleman from Kentucky (Mr. Metcalfe), as the mother of Republics. But, sir, this fine delusion is dissipated. The message of the Mexican president begins with celebrating, in the most fulsome strains, the power, the wisdom, the magnanimity of Great Britain, in her trans- actions with the Spanish American states, and distinctly attributes the disconcertion of the schemes of their enemies to the interposition of the British trident — which trident was never interposed in any other Way than by forming commercial relations with them, for her own henefit, and even this was not done until three or four years after we had made a formal and explicit acknowledgment of their independence. But we recog- nize no traces of that ardent devotion, that fervent gratitude, that affec- tionate confidence, which we have been taught to believe were cherished in all Spanish American hearts toward us, and of which there are such ample end gratuitous displays toward Great Britain." Register of Delates in Congress (1826-26) Vol. II, Part II, 2085. 2i British and Foreign State Papers, XIII, 1068, Digitized by Microsoft® THE MONROE DOCTRINE 235 moral rectitude, have advanced under the system of a Federa- tive Republick, which, having been adopted amongst us, by the most spontaneous act on record, exalts us to the level with the Country of Washington and establishes the most intimate union between the neighboring countries." 22 The Central American provinces, during the greater part of the period of the wars of emancipation, constituted a sort of eddy in which the general movement of revolution produced but few of the destructive effects suffered by other sections. Their independence was achieved with relatively little sacri- fice. 23 Their contact with foreign powers had been limited, and though the government took measures, upon the establish- ment of the Federation in 1824, to encourage immigration and to promote intercourse with the nations of Europe and Amer- ica, 24 progress in this direction was effectively checked by civil strife which soon began, and which in some parts of Central America has scarcely abated to this day. Under the circum- stances it would not be surprising to find that public opinion with regard to international affairs was less definite there than in other quarters. Such indeed was the case. An examination of the pages of the Gaceta del Gobierno Su- premo de Guatemala from its first issue on March 1, 1824, in an unbroken series to November of the same year, reveals the fact that practically all that was printed in that paper, during the period mentioned, with reference to the Monroe Doctrine was taken from a foreign source. For example, on March 26 there appeared an article entitled " Reflections on the message of the President of the United States," which was copied from El Sol of Mexico. 25 An article which appeared in the number for July 30, 1824, and which declared that the independence of the Hispanic American states, protected as it was by the 22 British and Foreign State Papers, XIII, 1069. 23 Gaceta del Gobierno Supremo de Guatemala, March 1, 1824. 2* British and Foreign State Papers, XII, 979. 25 The article was originally copied by El Sol from the National Gazette of Philadelphia for December 9, 1823. Digitized by Microsoft® 236 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS nations that possessed the institutions and spoke the language of liberty — Great Britain and the United States — was no longer in danger, is credited to the Gaceta de Cartagena, Co- lombia. In the issue for August 30, 1824, there was inserted a letter, written from London early in the- preceding January, which contained interesting observations on the Monroe Doc- trine and on the policy of Great Britain with regard to the intervention of the Holy Alliance in the affairs of the new states of the Western Hemisphere. But this communication also was first published in one of the gazettes of Colombia. The Central American state papers also lacked positive ex- pressions of opinion on the declaration of President Monroe or on the situation which that declaration was intended to meet. The message of the executive upon the opening of the congress at Guatemala on March 1, 1826, reviews the foreign relations of the republic, and in referring to the United States says merely that they " have acknowledged our independence with the greatest good will, and have given us testimony of great friendship and good understanding." 26 The executive, how- ever, on a previous occasion was somewhat more definite. In a circular which he addressed to the provincial governors he declared that " England protects our just cause. She has dis- patched consuls to the American nations. She cooperates in the development of our resources. She promotes our progress and she has decided to recognize our independence. The United States has a well-defined interest in the southern republics. That nation has recognized our independence and has sent us consuls. Moreover the message of the President on the open- ing of the Congress, December 2, 1823, declares in unmistak- able terms that the government would resist an attack on our rights by the allied powers of Europe. 27 Before passing to the continent of South America a brief reference may be made to the republic of Haiti. It will be re- 26 British and Foreign, State Papers, XIII, 1020. 27 Oaceta del Gobiemo Supremo de Guatemala, September 13, 1824. Digitized by Microsoft® THE MONROE DOCTRINE 237 called that the independence of that republic had been declared as early as 1804; that France was never able thereafter to re- establish her authority over the colony ; that the unification of the conflicting factions into a single government effective throughout the island had been accomplished by the time the United States resolved in 1822 to recognize the governments set up by certain of the former Hispanic American colonies. Haiti, however, was not included among the number to be recog- nized, and apparently the declaration of President Monroe of December 2, 1823, did not embrace that republic. In a com- munication to the Senate on the political condition of Santo Domingo, Monroe stated on February 26, 1823, that the gov- ernment of the island had not been molested in the exercise of its sovereignty by any European power and that no invasion of it had been attempted by any power. He added, however, that it was understood that the relations between the republic and the government of France had not been adjusted. The President had been requested to communicate to the Sen- ate not only such information as he might possess as to the political condition of Haiti and as to whether sovereignty over it were claimed by any European nation, but also as to whether any further commercial relations with it would be consistent with the interests and safety of the United States. In com- plying with this request Monroe called attention to the provi- sions of the Haitian constitution which prohibited the employ- ment of all white persons who had immigrated there since 1816, and which prohibited also the acquisition by such persons of the right of citizenship or of the right to own real estate in the island. The establishment of a government on such princi- ples, he thought, evinced distinctly the idea of a separate inter- est and of a distrust of other nations. To what extent that spirit might be indulged or to what purposes applied, experience, he declared, had been up to that time too limited to make pos- sible a just estimate. Commercial intercourse existed, he added, and it would be the object of the government to promote it. Digitized by Microsoft® 238 PAN-AMEPJCANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS But in this connection he assured the Senate that every cir- cumstance which might by any possibility affect the tranquillity of any part of the Union would be guarded against by suitable precautions. 28 It was evident, therefore, that Haiti was not placed by the United States on an equal footing with the governments which had been set up on the mainland. In this attitude toward Haiti the United States was not alone. England and France for obvious reasons looked with disfavor upon the establish- ment of a black republic in the West Indies. 29 And even Bolivar, who had received aid from President Petion in 1816 and who professed great friendship for the Haitian people, re- frained from inviting the government of that island to partici- pate in the congress of Panama. 80 The omission of any allusion to Haiti in the message of De- cember 2, 1823, met with protest on the island. A Haitian newspaper, Le Propagateur, commenting upon the declaration of President Monroe and applauding the procedure of the United States in extending the hand of friendship to the rising nations of South America, remonstrated against the treatment of Haiti as follows : " But why has not the name of Haiti been mentioned in this message? Does our course differ from that of the southern nations? Have we shown less courage, less idolatry, in the cause of liberty? Are we less advanced in civilization, or is our government weaker and less stable? To all these we an- swer in the negative. If we morally compare our population with that of Mexico or Peru, the result will be entirely to our 28 Am. State Papers, For. Bel., V, 240. 28 Leger, La Politique Exterieure d'Haiti, 6. so Leger, Haiti, Her History and her Detractors, 171. Haiti sent an agent to propose a defensive alliance with Colombia, but not wishing to antagonize France and resenting the absorption by Haiti of the Spanish portion of the island, which had resolved upon annexation to Colombia, this republic declined the proposal. See the message of the vice-president to the Congress of Colombia, January 2, 1825. British and Foreign Papers, XII, 822. Digitized by Microsoft® THE MONROE DOCTRINE 239 advantage. We have proved our strength by long and terrible conflicts, and the troops that we have vanquished were neither small in number nor of ordinary bravery. They were the vic- tors of the pyramids of Abouker and Marengo, whose remains now sleep on our plains." 31 Continuing, the writer sets forth in greater detail the claims of Haiti upon the United States for recognition and for its good offices. The Americans, he averred, especially those of the north, were the natural friends of Haiti ; and an extensive commerce already existed between the two countries. America could supply the articles which Haiti received from Europe, but Europe could never supply those furnished by America. Time would bring about closer relations which no future diffi- culties could interrupt. The people of the United States might possess the commerce of both Indies and the Haitians would not envy them the enjoyment of it. They were content to live on the soil where Providence had placed them. They would not emigrate. Haiti was justified, therefore, in desiring the good offices of the United States. It had been intimated, the writer added, that the question of color embarrassed the cabinet at Washington. He thought that if such pitiful considerations existed they would gradually lose their force. The red chil- dren of the American forests were admitted into the halls of Washington — why was that favor denied to the citizens of Haiti ? They should not despair of obtaining it, for that era in America was so splendid, so magnificent in promises that it forcibly recalled to the writer's mind the prediction of a mon- arch of the preceding century : " L'Europe finit, l'Amerique commence." 32 Turning now to the continent of South America, the state of opinion in the Bolivarian republics may first be considered. And in order that that opinion may be justly appreciated it siNiles' Weekly Register, XXV, 413; The Examiner (London), October 24, 1824. 32Niles' Weekly Register, XXV, 413. Digitized by Microsoft® 240 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS will be indispensable to view it in its proper historical perspec- tive, for which the preceding chapters have in general furnished the guiding lines. There is, however, one important detail, barely referred to in the preceding pages, which must now re- ceive fuller treatment: the opposition of the vice president of Colombia, Santander, to the policies of the Liberator. It must be remembered that Bolivar believed that the people of the former Spanish colonies were not prepared to conduct highly democratic governments. He believed, on the contrary, that the aristocratic principle was essential to good government, especially where, as was the case throughout Spanish America, ignorance and political inexperience prevailed among the great mass of the people. He believed that the executive should be elected for life, should exercise his authority without responsi- bility, should name his successor; should, in fact, be king in everything except name. His dream was of a great federation of Hispanic American states of which his own Great Colom- bia should be the head. In this he undoubtedly had the good will of Great Britain, who viewed with jealousy the in- evitable expansion of the United States toward the south and west. 33 Francisco de Paula Santander, elected as vice president of the republic of Colombia in 1821, exercised the chief magistracy during the five years of Bolivar's absence in the south. He had been one of Bolivar's generals and, though still under thirty years of age and untried in statecraft when he was called to the presidential chair, he apparently enjoyed the fullest confidence of his chief and of the people as a whole.; The origin and cul- mination of the break in friendly relations between the two men constitutes a long chapter in the history of Colombia. It is essential to the present purpose, however, to know merely the main issue. It is likely that the quarrel had an earlier origin than appears on the surface. Possibly, the beginning as For the British attitude see Adams, E. D., British Interests and Activities in Texas, 15. Digitized by Microsoft® THE MONROE DOCTRINE 241 of the trouble goes back to the adoption of the constitution it- self. The Liberator, displeased that so democratic and as he believed impractical an instrument as was the constitution of Oucuta should have been accepted, finally countenanced, if he did not foment, its overthrow to make way for his Bolivian constitution. Santander on the other hand became the cham- pion of the constitution of 1821, whether sincerely and patri- otically as his partisans declare or whether as a demagogue, in- tent on selfish ends as his detractors maintain, is a matter of controversy with which this study has no concern. The essential fact is that in the republic of Colombia there were, at the time the Monroe Doctrine was proclaimed, in proc- ess of formation two main currents of opinion which were to become clearly defined two or three years later ; one favorable to Bolivar and to the promotion of his political designs and an- other to Santander and to his conception of a democratic re- public. 34 The former group inclined toward Great Britain and the latter toward the United States. In the light of these re- marks, attention may now be directed to some of the comments evoked in Colombia by the message of December 2, 1823. The following article appearing in La Gaceta de Colombia, a newspaper published at Bogota, if not written by Santander himself must have been inspired by him. 35 " The United States has now begun to play among civilized nations of the world that powerful and majestic role which befits the oldest and most powerful nation of our hemisphere. We deeply regret our inability to publish all of the message of the President to Congress of December 2, for it is one of the most interesting documents which has emanated from the Amer- ican Government up to this time. It abounds in those sug- 3 * O'Leary, Memorias, XXVIII, Villanueva, El Imperio de los Andes, 62-80 and passim. Ibid., Bolivar y el General San Martin, 270-277. 35 La Qaceta de Colombia, though not an official government organ, was at least friendly to the administration and responded to the desires of Vice President Santander. He often spoke of it as " our gazette " and according to his own statements frequently wrote articles for publication in its columns. O'Leary, Memorias, III, 105, 111, 124, 137, 353, 390. Digitized by Microsoft® 242 PAN-AMEKICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS gestions and details which every free government ought to fur- nish its citizens in order that they may judge in regard to the interests of the nation with the proper exactness and discern- ment. How different is this frank and loyal mode of procedure from that horrid system which finds its stability in the secrets of the cabinet and in ministerial maneuvers. The enemies of liberty may take pleasure in the triumphs of that system on the European side of the Atlantic, where its favorite principle of legitimacy has numerous partisans. In this favored continent there are no classes interested in perpetuating the ignorance of the people that they may thrive upon prejudice and stupid- ity. In America man is only the slave of the law, while in a large part of the Old World people still believe and obstinately maintain that kings are an emanation of divinity. " The partisans of this impious doctrine defend it rather be- cause of self-interest than because of conviction. But, as they find some credulous persons and some persons who are victims of their own voluntary errors, they find support in them for their system of pretended legitimacy. Well and good, let the supporters of legitimacy extend their senseless system over that continent which, because of its enlightenment, is worthy of a better fate. If they wish, let them reduce to ashes the Swiss cantons, which rebelled against the august house of Hapsburg and established their independence by their own efforts. Let them take the throne of the Low Countries away from the house of Orange which to-day enjoys the fruit of its religious and practical rebellion against the Catholic kings. Let them punish, if they are able, the thousandth generation in their and other countries of Europe for the sins of their ancestors against legiti- macy. Their rage will ever be impotent on this side of the Atlantic. America is separated from those less fortunate re- gions by a vast ocean in which there will be drowned forever the hopes of those who imagine that we have not yet emerged from the darkness of the fifteenth century. " The perusal of the message which we have before us has Digitized by Microsoft® THE MONROE DOCTRINE 243 consequently furnished us with much pleasure, for the Presi- dent of the United States has profited by the opportunity afforded by the differences pending with Russia to assert that the American continent is now so free and independent that henceforth it cannot be made the theatre of colonization by any European power. Indeed the Americans of the North and of the South of this continent shall not behold again in their lands those hordes of foreigners, who, with the cross in one hand and a dagger in the other, would disturb the happiness and the peace which they to-day enjoy." 36 On April 6, 1824, Vice President Santander sent a message to the Colombian congress in which he referred to the Monroe declaration as follows : " The President of the United States has lately signalized his Administration by an Act eminently just and worthy of the classic land of liberty: in his last Message to the Con- gress he has declared that he will regard every interference of any European Power directed to oppress or violate the destinies of the Independent Governments of America as a manifestation of hostile dispositions toward the United States. That Govern- ment considers every attempt on the part of the Allied Powers to extend their System to any portion of the American Hemi- sphere as perilous to the peace and safety of the United States. This policy, consolatory to human nature, would secure to Colombia a powerful Ally should its Independence and Liberty be menaced by the Allied Powers. As the Executive cannot regard with indifference the march which the Policy of the United States has taken it is sedulously occupied in reducing the question to decisive and conclusive points." 3T The foregoing expressions are of still greater force when they as La Oaceta de Colombia, February 1, 1824. The translation employed by W. S. Robertson in his article on South America and the Monroe Doctrine in the Political Science Quarterly for March, 1915, Vol. XXX, is followed. 37 O'Leary, Memorias, 492. A translation of the message is found in British and For. State Papers, XI, 808, from which the above extract is taken. Digitized by Microsoft® 244 PAN-AMEKICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS are taken in connection with the brief remarks in the same mes- sage respecting Great Britain. The relations of the republic with Europe had been limited, the vice president declared, to Great Britain, whose policies were favorable to the American cause and whose commercial intercourse had been most ex- tensive and active in Colombia. The sympathy of the public in England and the justice of the British Government in- spired in the executive the most encouraging prospects ; but he was sorry that he could not say what had been the final reso- lution of the government of his Britannic Majesty with respect to the republic. He concluded by referring to the presence in Bogota of a British commission, which he considered a satis- factory sign of the interest that Colombia had inspired in the people of Great Britain. 38 The friendly attitude of the Santander administration toward the United States is succinctly set forth in a dispatch of Richard C. Anderson, the American minister at Bogota. Writing under date of February 17, 1824, he said: " Much of that solicitude, to which I have recently referred in my letters to you, in relation to the public affairs of this country as connected with the designs of certain European powers, is still felt by the persons in authority here and indeed by others; but great and I believe unaffected joy was expressed on the arrival of the President's message, at the views therein communicated to Congress, regarding the feelings and policy of the United States in the event of European interference in the political affairs of this continent. Some declared that it would have the salutary effect of repressing the designs and averting the calamity so much deprecated, while others, less sanguine in their opinion of its preventive tendencies, seemed to derive their joy from the contemplation of the actual aid which the course indicated might give in the expected contingency; but all declared that the views assume the true American ground. From the conversations, which I have hitherto de- 3s O'Leary, Memorias, III, 495. Digitized by Microsoft® THE MONROE DOCTRINE 245 tailed to you, between the Secretary of Foreign Affairs and myself, you will readily believe that the language and senti- ments of the message were very acceptable to him, and he took occasion in a recent conversation to tell me that they were pe- culiarly grateful to the vice president." 39 The article of the Oaceta de Colombia quoted above and the message of Vice President Santander credit the United States with taking a high and independent stand with regard to the affairs of the New World. The contemporary discussions in Mexico, as has been shown, invariably placed Great Britain in first place as a champion of the rights of the new governments, leaving the United States in a secondary if not in a dependent position with respect to England. And indeed such was usually the case in Colombia also, 40 the attitude of Santander and per- haps of a few others to the contrary notwithstanding. Curi- ously enough, Santander himself in his correspondence with the Liberator, reflecting, no doubt, the common opinion and that of the strong, overpowering personality of the great leader whose influence was ever present to him, gave expression to views much more favorable to Great Britain and correspond- ingly less so to the United States. Writing to Bolivar five days after the article on Monroe's message appeared in the Oaceta de Colombia, Santander ex- pressed the opinion that England would prevent other powers from intervening in the war in America. He had received from the message of President Monroe, he said, a similar im- pression respecting the United States. 41 A month later, re- ferring to the congress of the powers which it was proposed to convene for the purpose of discussing American affairs, San- tander informed Bolivar that it had become dear that the 39 Robertson, South America and the Monroe Doctrine in Polit. Sci. Quar., XXX, 84. 40 See La Gaeeta de Colombia for March 21, 1824, April 4, 1824, and August 29, 1824; El Venezolano, for January 17, 1824; El Patriota de Guayaquil for May 1, 1824, and August 28, 1824; O'Leary, Memorias, VIII, 29. 4i O'Leary, Memorias, III, 137. Digitized by Microsoft® 24:6 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS United States and Great Britain would not intervene as long as Spain alone and with her own resources continued the war. Moreover the British commissioners who had recently arrived at Bogota gave assurance that England would not permit Co- lombia to be subjugated. 42 In a letter dated March 15 he gave an account of the formal reception of the British agents, trust- ing that the news would cause in the Liberator an agreeable im- pression and inspire in him hopes of great consideration. Whatever proposals these commissioners had to make it seemed clear that England would take the part of Colombia against the Holy Alliance. And referring again to the message of Presi- dent Monroe he said it had made a strong impression in Eu- rope, causing the Holy Alliance to be extremely incensed, not merely because the President spoke in a threatening tone but because the Powers suspected that Great Britain had a hand in the declaration. King Ferdinand had solicited the mediation of the Powers, he said finally, but England per- sistently refused to take part in a congress to discuss American affairs. 43 By the middle of the next year the importance of the United States as a factor in the international situation had, in the opinion of Santander, greatly diminished, while that of Eng- land had correspondingly increased. Meanwhile a most sig- nificant event for Colombia had occurred — the recognition of its independence by Great Britain. Spain, protesting against this procedure of the British Government, obstinately continued the war. France still occupied the Peninsula and, though pro- fessing neutrality in the war in America, sent a squadron to Martinique. On the pretext of illegal seizure of her merchant vessels by Colombian privateers, she also maintained men of war in front of Puerto Cabello while the claims were being adjusted. Moreover it was believed that French troops were being sent to Porto Pico and Cuba to relieve the regular garri- *2 O'Leary, Memorias, III, 139. « IUd., Ill, 141. Digitized by Microsoft® THE MONROE DOCTRINE 247 sons for service against some one of the Central or South Amer- ican states. These circumstances, together with the fact that the general disposition in Europe toward the new states had apparently not improved, convinced Santander that there still existed a propensity on the part of the Powers to intervene. Such at least seemed to be the situation as he saw and described it in letters to Bolivar in the first half of the year 1825. And it is significant that in view of the danger which he believed to exist he declared that the United States would do nothing; for the country was completely permeated with the idea of peace and President Adams was, as he was painted, a man of peaceful disposition and of but little force of character. 44 As to Eng- land he seemed to be more confident. Parliament had aug- mented the military forces of the nation, and Canning in recent negotiations with Spain had declared that Great Britain would not take a backward step in her American policy. 45 During the early part of 1824, Bolivar was in northern Peru engaged in organizing his final campaign against the Royalists. It does not appear at what moment he first received intelligence of President Monroe's message. On March 21 he apparently had not yet heard of it; for, writing to Sucre on that date, he said: "I do not believe at all in the league between Erance 44 Los Estados Unidos Amalgainados con sv, estado de paz, qui s6 yo que hardn: el Presidente Adams es hombre muy pacifioo y de poca energia segun lo pintan. — Santander to Bolivar, June 21, 1825; O'Leary, Memorias III, 184. On a previous occasion Santander writing to Bolivar (May 6, 1825), had expressed a more favorable opinion. He said: "Mr. Adams, who was Secetary of State, is now President and Clay, our ardent friend, is Secretary of State. Bush, who was Minister to England, and was there of great service to Bevenga, is Secretary of Treasury. I do not believe we could have an administration more friendly and decided for American interests and especially those of Colombia." — O'Leary, Memorias, III, 175. On January 21, 1826, Santander wrote Bolivar that " If the Holy Alliance has not taken action against us actively and specifically I attribute it to two principles: First, to the policy of England, who fortunately was obliged by her own interests to take the part of the American states; second, to our not having given the sovereigns cause for provocation, for on the one hand our protests of respect and on the other our great suffer- ings have calmed the anger of the European cabinets." Ibid., Ill, 239. « O'Leary, Memorias, III, 164, 172, 175, 179, 183. Digitized by Microsoft® 248 PAN-AMEEICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS and Spain. We have documents which prove the contrary. But I do believe that the English are resolved to protect us." 46 Between this date and April 9 following he must have received news from the northern coast of Colombia, probably by way of Panama, including information respecting the Monroe declaration, if not a copy of the message, for he then wrote to Sucre as follows : " The English commissioners who have arrived at Santa Marta have assured us that their government will soon recognize us and, if we should break with France, give us aid against that power. Spain can do nothing because she has no navy, no army, nor money ; and whatever she should attempt would be attributed to France, and therefore opposed as a foreign usurpation directed against England and her lib- erty. Any move that the Holy Alliance might make would be checkmated by England and the United States." 47 Writ- ing again to Sucre, five days later, Bolivar returns to the as- surances made by the British commissioners, expressing the belief that England would protect Colombia not only against the Holy Alliance but against Spain as well, for Spain had come to be looked upon as one of the allies. He expressed also the conviction that recognition might be expected from Great Britain at any moment. If in the former letter he had really had in mind the declaration of President Monroe he did not on this occasion again refer to it. 48 In none of his published writings does Bolivar mention spe- cifically the Monroe declaration. A letter which he wrote to Admiral Guise of the Peruvian Xavy, however, on April 28, 1824, contains what is undoubtedly a reference to it. On this occasion he made a brief summary of what he considered to be the international situation. He had received gazettes up to March 15 from Jamaica. They contained, said Bolivar, many extracts from the columns of a London paper which assured in the most positive manner : *« Ibid., XXX, 459. 47 0'Leary. Memorias, XXX, 465. *»Jlid., XXX, 473. Digitized by Microsoft® THE MONROE DOCTRINE 249 " 1. That Spain has neither the means nor the credit to fit out a single man-of-war. In England therefore they regard her proposed expeditions as quixotic. " 2. That France and Austria, in reply to England's official inquiry as to what will be their attitude relative to Spain and her former colonies, have replied: France, that she will not intervene or take any other part; and Austria, that she will not go beyond mediation or the tender of good offices. " 3. That England has definitely decided to recognize the independence of the republics of South America and to con- sider as an unfriendly act any intervention on the part of any European power in the affairs of America. " 4. That the United States has solemnly declared that it will consider as an unfriendly act any measure that the powers of Europe should take against America and in favor of Spain." 40 Admiral Guise had become dissatisfied in the service of Peru and had threatened to return to Chile, whence he had come with Lord Cochrane in 1821. Bolivar wrote with the evident intention of conciliating him and of preventing his departure by presenting to him the prospect of victory and an early return to the pursuits of peace. He therefore brought forward all the factors that seemed to favor the cause. It is a remarkable fact that the only subsequent reference that the Liberator ap- pears to have made to the declaration of Monroe had for its object to induce the Spanish general, Olaneta, to join the Pa- triot cause. " England and the United States," Bolivar wrote him on May 21, 1824, " protect us, and you must know that these two nations are the only maritime powers and that no aid can come to the Royalists except by sea." 80 Whether Bolivar had by this time received the Bogota gazettes and the letters of Santander, referred to above, his writings do not show; nor does he subsequently make any ref- ♦oO'Leary, Memorias, XXX, 486-488, eo Ibid., XXX, 496. Digitized by Microsoft® 250 PAN-AMEEICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS erence to them. This may be explained by the fact that the information therein contained had ceased to be news, or by the fact that other matters of more immediate importance oc- cupied his attention. Leaving the coast early in April, Bolivar established his headquarters in the mountains and began an active prosecution of the campaign against the Eoyalists. Dur- ing the next seven or eight months he appears to have been com- pletely absorbed in the attainment of a final victory over the enemy. His letters, usually abounding in references to inter- national affairs, were during this period confined almost ex- clusively to military matters. 61 Not until success was prac- tically assured did he again turn his attention to the broader realm of international politics. It was on the eve of the battle of Ayacucho that he sent out his circular inviting the Spanish American states to the Congress of Panama. Hence- forward his heart was set upon the building up of a great Hi- spanic American state or confederation under the powerful in- fluence of Great Britain. In a word he did not greatly rely upon any protection that the United States might afford nor accept the leadership in this hemisphere which was implied in President Monroe's declaration. 52 Brazil at the beginning of 1824 occupied with respect to Portugal a position analogous to that which the former Spanish colonies occupied with regard to Spain. Independence, which had been achieved in the one and the other case, had not been recognized by the mother country, and Brazil, like the Spanish speaking states, stood in more or less danger of subjugation in the event that the Holy Alliance should attempt to carry out its designs. If, however, the hopes of the Legitimists of Europe were illusory in so far as the recovery of the colonies of Spain was concerned, they were much more so with respect to Por- tugal and her American possessions ; for this little kingdom was si O'Leary, Memorias, XXX, 465 et seq. 52 For a fuller treatment of Bolivar's international policies see the pre- ceding chapter on monarchy in America and those on the Congress of Panama, Digitized by Microsoft® THE MONROE DOCTRINE 251 even less able than Spain to provide the military forces required to reduce and to hold in subjection its vast expanse of American territory. Moreover the relation which had subsisted for more than a century between Portugal and Great Britain — at this time in reality almost one of suzerain and subject — made any interference of the continental powers in Portuguese affairs, in- ternal or external, practically impossible without provoking war with the virtual sovereign. But in spite of this relation, the British Government, far from attempting on its own part to establish the authority of the mother country over her American colony, favored the separation. It was in fact through a British diplomat, Sir Charles Stuart, that the negotiations were begun in March, 1824, which resulted a year and a half later in the signing of a treaty in which Portugal recognized the inde- pendence of Brazil. 63 Thus, in its actual and prospective relations with Europe, Brazil stood in a fairly satisfactory position. With regard to its South American neighbors, however, conditions were less favorable. The seizure of the Banda Oriental and later its in- corporation into the empire was now a source of friction and of possible war with Buenos Aires. It was at this time that the train of circumstances was set in motion which led to the out- break, in 1825, of hostilities between the two states. 54 And to add to Brazil's difficulties the sympathies of the Spanish speak- ing states ran strongly against the empire. Bolivar, for exam- ple, after his victory over the Royalists in Peru, actually had under consideration a plan for joining forces with the United Provinces and leading an expedition against Brazil for the pur- pose of effecting the overthrow of the monarchy. And it was rumored that the Congress of Panama would support such a design. 55 Isolated, then, in the southern continent, Brazil un- 53 Cambridge Modern History, X, 319, British and Foreign State Papers, XIII, 933, Constancio, Historic, do Brasil, II, 378. s* British and Foreign State Papers, XIII, 748-774. 65 O'Leary, Memorias, III, 215-216, 235, Villanueva, El Imperio de los Andes, 328-334. Senator Berrien of Georgia in a speech on the Panama Digitized by Microsoft® 252 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS doubtedly welcomed the policy of President Monroe not merely as constituting a barrier against the Holy Alliance, but as offering the hope of a friendly interest on the part of the United States which might redound to the benefit of the empire in its threatened conflict with the neighboring republic. 56 Brazil had not yet been recognized by the United States. Its status with respect to the declaration of President Monroe was therefore not so clear as was that of those governments who had " declared their independence and maintained it," and whose independence the United States had, " on great consideration and just principles," acknowledged. Desiring to terminate this undefined state of affairs the government of Brazil appointed Jose Silvestre Bebello as charge d'affaires to the United States. His instructions, dated January 31, 1824, referred to the message of President Monroe as being applicable to all the states of the continent, since it recognized the necessity of com- bining and standing shoulder to shoulder for the defense of American rights and for the integrity of American territory. Bebello was accordingly instructed first to urge the recognition mission delivered in the United States Senate in March, 1826, said: " Brazil yet bows beneath the imperial sway. The glitter of diadem is offensive to the Spanish American republics. The Liberator pants to finish the great work to which he thinks he is called — the emancipation of a continent. Ere long the arms of the confederacy will press upon Brazil." Register of Debates in Congress, 1825-1826, II, part I, p. 280. 5 6 In Cartas Politicas by " Americus," published in London in 1825, from letters first appearing in the Brazilian newspaper, Padre Amaro, frequent references are found indicating that in Brazil as in other sections of Latin America the United States and Great Britain were associated together in interposing a. common barrier to the designs of the Holy Alliance. Such expressions as the following appear : " Fortunately the policies and interests of the two powerful nations, England and the United States, are opposed to the project of reconquest " (I, 25) . . . " It will be impossible for any European power or all of them together to subjugate Brazil, principally because of the aid which is offered by the maritime power of Great Britain and the United States" (I, 26) ... "England and the United States oppose all cooperation of this sort "... ( Coalition for the subjugation of the new American states) (I, 50). These letters have been attributed to the Brazilian statesman, J. Severiano Maciel da Costa. Digitized by Microsoft® THE MONROE DOCTRINE 253 of the independence of Brazil, and secondly to sound the gov- ernment of the United States as to its attitude toward an offen- sive and defensive alliance to be based not on mutual conces- sions but on the general principle of mutual benefits. Rebello was received and thus the empire of Brazil was recognized on May 26, 1824. On this occasion the Brazilian spoke of a " con- cert of American powers to sustain the general system of Ameri- can independence." To this the President did not particularly allude in his reply, confining himself rather to general expres- sions of friendly interest. The idea of forming an alliance with the United States was kept alive however, by the Brazilian rep- resentative for nearly a year afterward until finally, a definite proposal having been made in writing, Clay, then Secretary of State, disposed of the matter by declining to enter into any such agreement on the ground that it was contrary to the policy of the United States. 57 The efforts of Brazil were thus directed from the beginning toward securing a definition of the Monroe Doctrine on the basis of what was called the principle of mutual benefits ; that is, its transformation from a unilateral to a bilateral policy. As has been suggested above, the empire doubtless wished to strengthen its position among its neighbors by forming an al- liance with the United States. This is not, however, the whole explanation. It was felt that the acceptance of the protection offered by the United States without giving anything in return placed Brazil in a position of inferiority. Accordingly Rebello in his written proposal, called attention to the fact that if the government of the United States should be obliged to put into practice the principles enunciated in President Monroe's mes- sage, thus giving proof of generosity and consistency, it would do so only at the sacrifice of men and treasure, and that it was s? Adams, Memoirs, VI, 484. Moore, Digest of Int. Law, VI, 437. Adams speaking in his diary of the proposed treaty of alliance between Brazil and the United States says that Rebello agreed that "on certain contingencies the republican governments of South America should also be parties." — Memoirs, VI, 475. Digitized by Microsoft® 254 PAN-AMEEICANTSM: ITS BEGINNINGS not in accordance with reason, justice, and right that the gov- ernment of Brazil should receive such services gratuitously. It was for this reason therefore that the convention had been proposed. 68 In Argentina the first public notice of President Monroe's declaration appeared on February 9, 1824, when extracts from the message of December 2 were published in La Gaceta Mer- cantil of Buenos Aires. A few days later El Argos of the same city printed passages from the message and called attention es- pecially to the noncolonization and the nonintervention clauses. On February 10 the American minister, Kodney, wrote Presi- dent Monroe that his message had been received two days before, that it had inspired them all there and that it would have the " happiest effect throughout the whole Spanish provinces." On May 22 he wrote Secretary Adams that the frank and firm message of the President had been productive of happy effects ; but that he looked not so much to its temporary influence as to its permanent operation. " We had it immediately translated," he wrote, " into the Spanish language, printed and generally distributed in this quarter, Peru and Chile." 59 In a message of the provincial executive authority of Buenos Aires to the legislative assembly on the occasion of its opening on May 3, 1824, the following reference was made to the declar- ation of President Monroe: " Peace has been maintained with the nations of the con- tinent ; and every true American heart has been filled with satis- faction at the reception in our city of the first minister pleni- potentiary of the republic of the United States ; an honor which has been returned by the appointment of a minister of corre- sponding rank, who has already departed for "Washington. He has been instructed to suggest to the government of that republic how desirable it would be if, in addition to those two great 58 Robertson, South America and the Monroe Doctrine in Polit Sci Quar XXX, 95. so IMd., 98. Digitized by Microsoft® THE MONROE DOCTRINE 255 principles; namely, that of the abolition of piratical warfare, and that of the non-European colonization of American terri- tory, it could also be declared that none of the new governments of this continent shall alter by force their respective boundaries as recognized at the time of their emancipation. Thus may be destroyed the germ of future dissensions which, springing up amongst new states, might have a fatal influence upon their civilization and manners. . . . The analogy of feelings and principles manifested by the cabinets of London and Washing- ton will convince Spain that she must contend singly with the free nations of the New World. This conviction will perhaps introduce into her councils that wisdom and moderation which are of so much importance to her existence." 60 On December 16, 1824, the congress of the United Provinces of Rio de la Plata opened its sessions at Buenos Aires. In a message of the government of Buenos Aires, laid before that body on the same date, the American policy of the United States was referred to in the following terms : " We have fulfilled a great national duty toward the republic of the United States of North America. That republic, which, from its origin, presides over the civilization of the New World, has solemnly acknowledged our independence. It has at the same time made an appeal to our national honor by supposing us capable of contending single-handed with Spain ; but it has con- stituted itself the guardian of the field of battle in order to pre- vent any foreign assistance from being introduced to the aid of our rival." 61 A just estimate of the value of the foregoing expressions re- quires that they be regarded in their proper historical setting. As for the views of Rodney, his arrival in Buenos Aires in November, 1823, allowed him but little time to become ac- «• British and Foreign State Papers, XI, 803, 805. ei A translation of this message is found in British and Foreign State Papers, XII, 858. For the original in Spanish see El National (Buenos Aires) for December 23, 1824. Digitized by Microsoft® 256 PAN-AMEEICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS quainted with the political opinions of the leaders of the coun- try to which he was accredited. 62 He was moreover already suffering from the illness of which he died the following June. 63 Under the circumstances therefore his impressions are of little value. He merely served as a means for transmitting the formal expressions of diplomatic intercourse. And as for the official utterances of the government of Buenos Aires, they must be viewed in the light of the policies of the responsible leaders of the administration. Elsewhere an account has been given of the efforts made by the United Provinces to solve the problems growing out of their revolt by establishing some sort of relation, dynastic or other, with some power of Europe, preferably Great Britain or France. Those efforts failed, and, the government responsible for the negotiations being driven from office, a new era domi- nated by republican aspirations began. An excessive spirit of localism, however, made impossible all progress toward the es- tablishment of an effective national government. The constitu- tion of 1819, promulgated with high hopes, being soon aban- doned, the term " United Provinces " continued to be, as it had always been, more or less a fiction as the expression of or- ganized nationality. 64 Such national functions as were exer- cised at all were exercised by the provincial authorities of Buenos Aires, whose leadership within certain limits was tacitly recognized. The governor of the province, General Martin Bodriguez, brought into his cabinet two of Argentina's ablest statesmen, Bernadino Bivadavia and Manuel Jose Garcia, both of whom had played important roles during the preceding five or six years in the negotiations looking to the establishment of a monarchical form of government. Bivadavia, who was ap- pointed Minister of Interior, conducted the foreign affairs of «2 Registro Oficial de la Republica Argentina, II, 46. For an account of Rodney's reception by the government of Buenos Aires see Palomeque, Orlgines de la. Dvplomacia Argentina, I, 114. 63 Monroe, Writings, VI, 430. Registro Oficial, II, 61. 6* Vedia, Constitution Argentina, 13. Digitized by Microsoft® THE MONROE DOCTRINE 257 Buenos Aires and of the other provinces as far as they had any intercourse with the exterior. He had been greatly influenced by the reaction toward absolutism in Europe and though he had given up the idea of seeing a throne erected at Buenos Aires, he looked with little favor upon the attempts to introduce too strong a democratic element into the government. 65 Moreover, his sympathies were decidedly European and he advocated meas- ures calculated to bring Europe and America into more inti- mate relations rather than to divide them into hostile camps. 66 For nearly a year past negotiations had, in fact, been going on with agents of the Spanish Government who had arrived in Buenos Aires in May, 1823, with instructions to effect a recon- ciliation with the American states. Rivadavia was appointed to represent the government of Buenos Aires in the negotiations and by a resolution of the Provincial Assembly, passed on July 19, he was authorized to treat with the Spanish commissioners on the basis of the cessation of hostilities against all the new states of the continent and the recognition by Spain of their independence. A preliminary treaty was signed on July 4, providing for an armistice of eighteen months within which period it was agreed that there should be negotiated a " definitive treaty of peace and amity between his Catholic Majesty and the states of the American continent." It was also provided by a separate agreement that the governments of the states 85 Lopez, Historia de la Reptiblica Argentina, IX, 79. •« The Argentina publicist, Alberdi, referring to the Panama Congress, among whose aims he believed to have been: First, the formation of a permanent league against Spain or any other power that should attempt to dominate America; and secondly, the prevention of all European coloniza- tion on this continent and of all foreign intervention in the affairs of the New World, says : " To the honor of Rivadavia and of Buenos Aires be it remembered that he was opposed to the congress of Panama and to its principles, because he comprehended that if he favored it he would destroy all his hopes of European immigration and of establishing closer relations between this continent and the Old World, which had always been and would continue to be the source of our civilization and progress." Organization de la Confederation Argentina, I, 34. See Registro Ofitial, II, 46, 47. The late president, Eoque Saenz PeBa, entertained similar ideas. See an article by him in Ateneo (Madrid), III, 368-394. Digitized by Microsoft® 258 PAN-AMERICANISM: ITS BEGINNINGS which should be recognized as independent under the proposed treaty should pay to Spain the sum of twenty million pesos through a loan to be raised in England. The government of Buenos Aires engaged to obtain the accession of Chile, Peru, and Colombia, and with that end in view immediately dis- patched an agent to those countries. Other agents were ap- pointed to treat with the provinces of Bio de la Plata, Paraguay, and Upper Peru. Chile promptly declined to become a party to the convention, and Peru and Colombia after consideration likewise declined to accede to it. But this was not known in Buenos Aires until some time after the news of President Monroe's message arrived there early in February, 1824. By this time, however, there was probably no longer any hope of attaining the object of the negotiations. 67 Though these negotiations came to nothing they are. worthy of note not merely as the mark of a conciliatory attitude toward the mother country, but as the concrete expression of the desire on the part of Buenos Aires to revive and tr extend the in- fluence which it had formerly exercised in Chile and Peru es- pecially, and to a less extent throughout the continent. 68 Buenos Aires, in short, disputed the leadership of Colombia. A " circular to the American states," signed by Kivadavia and dated February 5, 1824, singularly enough just three days be- fore the news of the message of President Monroe reached Buenos Aires, furnishes evidence of this aspiration. Bivadavia declared that his government, being under the obligation to de- fend the independence which the united sister republics of the American continent had proclaimed, addressed their respective governments for the purpose of informing them of the steps being taken in Europe to prolong the war in Peru (the only part not yet freed), and to prevent the full enjoyment of the